


The Scribe and the Sword

by wingthing



Series: The EQ Alternaverse [33]
Category: Elfquest
Genre: EQ Alternaverse, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-09
Updated: 2015-09-08
Packaged: 2018-04-19 20:48:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 19,241
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4760546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wingthing/pseuds/wingthing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clearbrook dreams of forging a new brightmetal sword, Kit struggles with a painful Recognition, and a new danger grows under the ruins of Blue Mountain.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Part One

“Tell me another story,” the cub demanded. 

“The sun’s coming up soon, and you need your rest. So do I. Another night.” 

“Please!” the cub whined plaintively, bouncing on the little wooden stool with impatience. “Tell me the story of Clearbrook and the sword.” 

“Again? You only like that one because you’re in it.” 

“Please? I promise I’ll be good.” 

“I’ve already told three howls tonight–” 

“Fine!” The cub got to her feet, shaking out the folds of her patchwork leather dress. “I’ll go ask Wesh to tell me!” she informed her with a haughty toss of the head. “He tells it better anyhow!” 

Kit sighed. “All right, cubling. Come here.” She gathered the six-year-old in her arms and set her on her lap. “Now this howl took place not too long ago–” 

“Eight years ago!” 

“Am I telling the story or are you? Though I daresay you know it well enough to tell it yourself. Now... where was I? This story took place not too long ago... on an evening in the leaf-fall not unlike any other. I suppose you could say it began with a dream... or a thought... a wish to become more than we are, and a will to see it through. But those words are the makings of a dull tale there, aren’t they, cubling? No... let’s tell it plainly. Because really, it all began with Clearbrook’s broken sword...” 

* * * 

They had planned the hunt well. The hunters had been eyeing the great stag for several moons now. He had shepherded his harem of females through the summer and defended his herd against intruders during the autumn rut. Now many of the females surely carried his offspring. The old stag had lived a long life, and the elves knew he would never see a leaf-fall in so noble a condition. It was right that he should die now, still just in the prime of life, before old age and starvation thinned his fine bones and clouded his clear eyes. 

They chose only their finest hunters and their fastest wolves. They set out before dusk, to catch the herd off guard in the late afternoon mist. Clearbrook and Nightfall harried the stag on wolfback, separating him from the herd. Woodlock and Redlance held the other deer away as the wolves drove the stag straight for the elm tree where Kit and Strongbow were waiting, arrows nocked. 

But suddenly everything went wrong. The stag reared up, trying to box Skitter in the skull, and the young wolf panicked, throwing Nightfall hard on her tailbone. Redlance rode in, spear at the ready. In a haze of adrenaline, Skitter threw himself on the stag, trying to seize its jugular. And then Clearbrook leapt clear off her own wolf to land on the stag’s shaggy back. 

The scene became a wild melee of fur and limbs. Neither Kit nor her father could get a clear shot at the stag. The stag bucked once more, kicking out at Clearbrook’s wolf. Then it reared on its hind legs and toppled over. The hunters rushed in to finish the kill. When the dust cleared, the stag lay dead with Clearbrook’s sword imbedded in its shoulder, while Clearbrook herself lay some distance away, clutching her sword arm. 

“Don’t – ahh!” Clearbrook cried out when Redlance tried to assess her wound. “Nngh... popped it clean out of place...” Redlance removed his cloth shirt and lashed it around Clearbrook’s arm, binding it to her ribs. 

“Woodlock. Take her back to your lifemate,” he commanded. 

Woodlock bore the injured hunter away, while Redlance paced over the stag. A good hunt, he thought to himself as he reached for Clearbrook’s sword. A hard chase, a worthy prey, and a clean, swift kill. 

He took hold of Clearbrook’s sword and tried to pull it free, but it was lodged deep in the stag’s shoulder. Planting one boot on the animal, he yanked will all his might. 

The sword broke free, but only half the blade came loose with the hilt. 

“Oh, puckernuts...” Redlance moaned, examining the shattered blade. “Clearbrook’s going to kill me.” 

But it was not the chief’s fault. When they butchered the animal later that night they found the broken pieces of brightmetal scattered throughout the fat, and the tip of the sword still lodged deep in the bone. 

* * * 

Rainsong righted Clearbrook’s arm by nightfall, though it was still badly bruised. But Clearbrook took the loss of her sword harder than the injury to her arm. 

“I’m so sorry, Clearbrook,” Redlance said, offering her the remains of her weapon. 

“It’s not your fault. It’s only... after all this time, done in by one bad thrust – just a hair off.” She weighed the metal in her left hand. “Look at how thin it’s worn... eight eights times eight turns of use... and then some.” 

“Littlefire can make you a fine blackstone dagger,” Kit prompted. “Isn’t that right?” she looked to her lifemate, who crouched in the corner of Rainsong’s den, close to the door and the fresh air. 

“Um... yes, yes,” Littlefire replied distractedly. “Or a spearhead.” 

“Thanks just the same,” Clearbrook said. “But a stone dagger won’t take the place of a good brightmetal blade.” 

“I want you to rest this arm,” Rainsong said. “I am not half the healer my father is, and I cannot promise you the sinew will not tear again if you exert yourself.” 

“Listen to her, lifemate,” One-Eye counselled. “Stay in the Holt for the next moon-dance.” 

“No worries,” Clearbrook sighed. “What good is a sword-arm without a sword?” 

“Is that a riddle?” Littlefire asked. He looked to Kit for guidance. 

“No, lifemate,” she said gently. “It’s just truth.” 

Clearbrook shifted on the fur pillows. “It’s a problem... and it’ll become a serious one, soon enough. We’ve done well for ourselves with Littlefire’s blackstone. But as time goes on, the rest of our metal will tire and break. And blackstone is too brittle for anything larger than a hand-axe or a dagger-point.” 

“Aye,” One-Eye stroked his little beard. “We’ve gone all these years without having to ask any trolls for metal. I’d hate to go begging for brightmetal now...” 

“Sun Folk have metal,” Littlefire offered. “W-we could go see them.” 

“Why shouldn’t we Wolfriders learn to forge metals?” Clearbrook asked the air softly. No one gave her an answer. She did not expect one. 

* * * 

The stag’s hide became new winter clothes for those in need, and One-Eye set to carving the bones into new fishing hooks, arrowheads and spearpoints. The snows settled in around the Evertree, and the Wolfriders fell into the idleness of the white-cold hibernation. The supplies of dried meat kept them healthy when prey was scarce, and the long winter nights were spent bundled inside their warm tree dens. Clearbrook nursed her sore shoulder, frequently returning to Rainsong’s den for new healings as the cold penetrated the bone and caused the joint to throb with pain. 

“You’re not giving it time to heal properly,” the healer told her. 

“It’s more than that. More than just the shoulder. My bones ache with the winter wind.” 

“Don’t start howling for the old wolf, Grandmother,” Rainsong scolded her gently. “You’re not so ancient. What is it? You’ve been sick at heart since your sword broke. I cannot believe this is all mourning for a lost weapon.” 

“No... it’s more. And the truth is... I was sick at heart before the sword broke. But I don’t think I realized it before I was forced to bed.” 

“What is the cause?” 

Clearbrook shrugged. “I don’t know. I only know... I feel restless. I find it harder and harder to live in the Now. I run in my dreams like a wolf chasing its own tail. I don’t know why.” 

“Perhaps Kit can help you,” Rainsong suggested. “I hear Littlefire has a dreamberry wine for every mood.” 

Clearbrook went to Kit’s bower at the canopy of the great Evertree. She drank Littlefire’s dreamberry wine and Kit’s memory tea. She closed her eyes and tried to relieve the dreams that disturbed her sleep. But she could manage nothing more than blurry images. 

“I am deep inside Blue Mountain... searching for Swift...” she murmured through the haze of the drug. “Though I’ve been here before, I don’t know my way about. There is no scent trail to follow.... The stone walls... dark and covered with raised symbols – they come to life... threaten....” she frowned. “I know they’re not real... no... they are only dreams. But there are enemies made of flesh here... Winnowill’s Chosen Eight. At every turn... I am braced for their attack. I can see... something moving in the darkness – Two-Edge!” she cried out. 

“It’s all right...” Kit whispered. “It’s only a dream. Come out of it.” 

“I’m lost.” Clearbrook rubbed her forehead. “I can’t remember anything else... just... visions of rocks, the sharp scent of trolls...” 

“It’s not unexpected.” 

“What?” 

“Your sword. The last time you wielded it in battle was at Blue Mountain, wasn’t it?” 

“You know the howls well.” 

“You’re reliving the old days... the times of danger and fear. Because even as you sleep, you mourn the loss of your weapon. You fear to be caught without it.” 

“Sometimes... you frighten me, cub. Can you read me as plainly as you read your howling hides?” 

Kit smiled and shook her head. 

“So what do I do?” Clearbrook asked. “How do I ease this restlessness in me?” 

“I think you know.” 

* * * 

“Do you?” One-Eye asked her as they lay in their bed of furs, watching the snow fall beyond the tree-shaped window in their bower. Clearbrook shrugged and buried her face in the furs. 

“You do, don’t you?” he probed, twining a lock of her long silver hair around his finger. **Perth? What is it?** 

**You’ll think it foolish,** she sent. **Crazy... far too cloud-headed for your steady Clearbrook.** 

“Tell me...” he whispered gently. 

She rolled over in bed to face him. Tears sparkled in her eyes. 

“Even as we followed Swift... to the Frozen Mountains and the New Land... I could never quite understood what drove her on her quests. That... restless fever for something just out of reach. The fire in your heart. Swift has it. Rayek has it. Hah – Redlance’s little cub has it, and I’m sure he’s wished more than once she didn’t. But for me... I’ve always been the calm water.” 

“Until now.” 

**Yes! Oh, Sur... now I understand what it is that’s always burned in Swift’s heart. The hunger... the aching need... like Recognition. Can one Recognize a dream?** 

He stroked her hair back from her face. **Share your dream with me, Perth. What is it you hunger for?** 

**A sword. A brightmetal blade forged by my own hand. And not just because I miss my old weapon,** she added hastily. **Because... because there’s no good reason Wolfriders shouldn’t forge metal as trolls do, as the Sun Folk do. Because I chase danger in my dreams, and I long to... to get between my chief and my kin and all the dangers there are to face. Because...** 

“What?” 

“I’m afraid.” 

“Of what, lifemate?” 

She averted her eyes. “All these seasons... one holt... one territory. With no Recognitions since gentle Kit was born. It used to be different. There used to be deaths. And terrible battles. And new lives to replace those lost. We used to change with the seasons. Yet now we do not. We do not change. We do not grow. And I cannot help but fear.... Will we become another Blue Mountain... deathless but lifeless as well? Or will death and danger come back into the Holt, when we least expect it? Will we be ready? Will I be ready?” 

“You’ve always been ready,” One-Eye reassured her, brushing a soft kiss against her brow. 

“I feel stagnation’s approach sometimes,” she whispered. “I feel myself growing old and brittle as a leaf in death-sleep. I need to live again, Sur. I need to chance the danger.” 

“You know I’ll be ever at your side.” 

She smiled fondly up at him. Gingerly as always, she traced her fingertips around the shiny scar that covered his right eye socket. “I know. My dear friend. You alone could give me the strength to see this dream through.” 

* * * 

Clearbrook waited until the first thaw of spring to request the tribal council. The gentle sounds of meltwater trickling away filled the air around the Evertree as the Wolfriders meet deep within its living walls. 

The council chamber was a great vaulted space in the heart of the Evertree, where Redlance’s treeshaping had held the founding oaks from merging into one trunk. Several little tallow candles threw great shadows against the wooden walls, yet scarcely illuminated the faces of the Wolfriders. It did not matter; save for Littlefire, they were all wolf-blooded, and their eyes glowed in the scant light. 

“I ask the tribe’s leave to journey beyond the Holt’s bounds,” Clearbrook began, “and seek an answer to the mystery of metal-forging. Littlefire’s skill in stonework is unmatched among the Wolfriders, but even he cannot knap a sword’s blade out of blackstone. The trolls have always guarded the secret of their forges. Yet the smiths of the Sun Folk have proven elves too can learn to forge weapons of metal. I would like to learn that secret for our tribe.” 

Her request caught some by surprise, while others simply smiled knowingly. 

“I never would have imagined you’d be the one to hunger for metalwork, Clearbrook,” Redlance said. 

“Nor I, had you asked me a few turns ago. But something’s burning inside me, my chief.” 

“But why metal?” Moonshade asked. 

**Aye,** Strongbow sent. **Why bother? What’s wrong with stone, bone and crystal weapons? What need have you for a sword in the forest anyway?** 

“Perhaps we needed swords in wars and mad quests,” Moonshade said. “But those days are behind us. Wolfriders used no metal in the days of Two-Spear or Goodtree. The days of swords – of fighting humans and trolls – they were only abberations.” 

“In the long line of chiefs, perhaps,” Nightfall said. “But that’s no promise those days may not return.” She slowly withdrew her dagger from its sheath and held it up to the candlelight. “I struggle to remember the day my mother gave me this. She always taught me that danger comes in many forms. One can never say what shape it will take. I fill my quiver with blackstone arrows every night. But I would never hunt with half such courage if I did not carry this metal blade at my side.” 

“Well spoken,” Rainsong said. “It’s a worthy dream, Clearbrook.” 

“It’s against the Way,” Moonshade argued. “Will you work in a troll’s cave, living off smoke and ash and forging weapons that Wolfriders were never meant to wield?” 

“Now wait a minute,” One-Eye began. “Are you calling Clearbrook against the Way?” 

“Enough,” Redlance said calmly. “There will be plenty of time to debate the uses of metal to a Wolfrider. And... it has always seemed to me that the Way was founded to tell us who we are, not what we cannot be. Clearbrook, we would welcome your gift of metalwork to the tribe.” 

“Thank you, my chief.” 

“And, One-Eye, I imagine you’ll be at your lifemate’s side,” Nightfall said. 

One-Eye nodded. Strongbow scowled. 

**Now we will be without two of our hunters.** 

“Which is why we waited until the thaw to ask,” Clearbrook said. “We ask for no more than one turn of the seasons – time enough to seek a teacher, and learn the craft. I promise, we will return by this coming white-cold, before your stores are emptied.” 

Redlance nodded. “We have been a tribe of eight before. We will continue hunt and howl when you are gone. But we will howl even louder for you when you return to us.” 

“So...” Nightfall said. “You make for the Sun Folk’s Oasis.” 

Clearbrook and One-Eye exchanged glances. “I... have in mind a closer destination,” Clearbrook said at length. “In my dreams, I find myself walking down familiar tunnels of Blue Mountain. I thought at first as you did, Kit. That the dreams were born of old fears. But I think they are telling me something else. Where better to learn the secret craft of the trolls than in halls of the Master Smith?” 

“Two-Edge?” Strongbow sputtered out aloud. **You’d go to that – that creature who would have lead us to our doom in the Palace War?** 

“You forget, Two-Edge helped us defeat Winnowill at Blue Mountain,” Nightfall said. 

**He’s still mad!** Strongbow thundered. 

“So am I,” Littlefire remarked calmly from his perch high above. Redlance had shaped it for him long before so he could listen in on council without being overwhelmed by his tribemates' presence. “So you say,” he added. “But he’s my father’s cousin. That means he’s my cousin too.” 

“He and his family have lived peacefully in the ruins of Blue Mountain for many eights of eights,” Clearbrook said. “I am certain he would welcome our visit.” 

“Would he?” Redlance asked. “Were I you, I would ask Sunstream to help you send to him. I’m as willing to forgive as any, but I do not know if I would simply ‘drop by Blue Mountain’ wishing for the best.” 

Clearbrook flushed. “Well said.” 

The council was all but over, with Redlance’s blessing sought and received. But Strongbow could scarcely help but end with one last ominous prediction. 

**I don’t like it,** he sent. ** Nothing good has ever come out of Blue Mountain.* 

* * * 

Spring was in full bloom at the Evertree as Clearbrook and One-Eye prepared for their long journey. Their hope was to reach Blue Mountain before midsummer, learn the craft throughout the warm months, and return to the Holt before winter set in. “An elf can learn to tan leathers within a season,” Clearbrook said whenever anyone suggested the project might take longer. “And once we learned to wage war in the span of a moon-dance. Can metal-work be so different?” 

The late afternoon hung over the Holt, cool and wet, as One-Eye woke to patrol the woods surrounding the Evertree. Many of the elves were still dozing, as were their wolves. One-Eye liked the solitude of the afternoon. It gave him time alone with his thoughts. 

His young wolf Flintsmoke joined him as he waded through the carpet of new green ferns slowly overtaking the forest floor. The wolf flushed out a bird, and One-Eye craned his neck back to watch it take it flight. 

An arrow whistled through the trees. The bird fell to the ground, pierced through the heart. 

“Kit?” One-Eye called. “Hey, Flintsmoke, leave it!” he commanded the wolf. 

A few moments later, the archer dropped down from the trees to claim her prey. “You’re up early,” Kit remarked cheerfully. 

“Not as early as you, it seems.” 

“Couldn’t sleep with all the larksong. Thought I’d catch myself a little something for later. The new-green’s come back to the land. Your travel to Blue Mountain should be without incident.” 

“No travel is ever without its dangers.” He shrugged. “Shouldn’t take more than a moon-dance to reach the old mountain. Wouldn’t mind if it took longer, really. Can’t say I fancy the idea of sealing myself inside rock. but if it’ll help Clearbrook forge her sword... well...” he shrugged again, lamely. 

“Do you believe in her quest?” 

“It’s not for me to say.” He shrugged. “This is no sort of dream I’ve ever shared. No sort of dream I could imagine. Yet I will see it through with her... whether it comes true or no.” 

“Clearbrook could not ask for a truer lifemate.” Kit gave his shoulder a friendly pat. “I’ll save the best hide of the season for your tale.” 

“There’s no tale yet, cub.” 

“Cub?” Kit raised an eyebrow. She could not help but tease him. “In the days of the old howls, I’d be a tribe elder.” 

One-Eye had the good grace to look abashed. “Ah... I’m sorry. I guess... were you a lad you’d be sprouting face-fur by now, wouldn’t you? But you’ll forgive an old growler, Kit. I may have my heart in the Now, but I’m afraid my old head gets stuck in the past.” 

Kit bent down to remove the arrow from the bird. “It’ll be a good tale, One-Eye. You’ll see.” She tied the birds’ legs together with a leather thong. She got to her feet and lifted the bird to sling over her shoulder, but One-Eye’s wolf leapt at her, planting his oversized paws on her shoulders and licking her face. Kit cried out in surprise, dropping her kill. 

“Agh, Flintsmoke, get off,” she sputtered, pushing the wolf away. “Phew, what were you rolling in?” 

“Flintsmoke!” One-Eye barked. “Don’t mind him.” He reached down to retrieve the bird. “He’ll be cured of his pup ways by the time we come back from the mountain. Here you go.” He reached up to hand Kit the bird. 

Kit took the bird from his hand, but he would not release it. His eyes remained locked on her face. 

“One-Eye...?” Kit asked. His face had become stricken. Kit felt a shudder run down her spine. 

“You... look.. different,” One-Eye breathed. **Tayr?** 

* * * 

“Lifemate...” One-Eye whispered in Clearbrook’s ear, waking her from her slumber. She rolled over and smiled sleepily at him. But one look at his sorrow-filled face and she was wide awake. 

“What’s wrong? What’s happened?” She stared deep into his single eye, puzzled at the strange new light glowing within. Beads of cold sweat dotted his brow. Unable to meet her gaze, he looked away, chewing his lip nervously. Clearbrook felt her heart sink as she remembered all the signs. 

“Recognition?” 

One-Eye nodded. 

“Who?” 

“Kit.” 

“Kit.” Clearbrook struggled to remain composed. She slowly sat up, wrapping the fur about her shoulders. “Kit. Have you...?” 

“No. Not yet. I could not without telling you first. And she is telling Littlefire.” 

“Do the others know?” 

“No.” 

“Good.” 

**Perth... this changes nothing between us.** 

She glared up at him, suddenly seething with resentment. “You will have a child I cannot share with you. Don’t tell me nothing changes.” 

He shook his head. “It will not be like that. Kit and I part ways once it is done. She will raise the cub in her den.” He laughed humourlessly. “Like as not the child will think Littlefire his father.” 

Clearbrook looked away. 

“This was not my choice, Clearbrook!” he insisted. 

“I know. And the tribe needs new life. And Recognition... is Recognition. Only a fool would try to deny such a simple truth.” 

She could not hide the bitterness in her words. **Perth,** he begged. **Please...** 

**Go,** she sent. **Go to her. And then come back to me.** When she at last looked up, tears filled her eyes. **Please, say you’ll come back as my Sur.** 

He embraced her fiercely. **I will,** he promised. **I will still be your Sur. And you will be my Perth. Nothing can change that. I swear it!** 

* * * 

One-Eye found Kit waiting for him at the Crow’s Nest, the lookout shaped at the very summit of the Evertree. She sat against the tree wall, her knees drawn up to her chest. Reading the discomfort plain on her face, One-Eye sat opposite her. 

“You look like a cornered ravvit,” he said, trying to lighten the mood. 

“I feel like one,” Kit ground out. 

“How... how did Littlefire take the news?” 

She laughed suddenly. “Better than I! Asked me if we were still lifemates. Asked me if it means I’m going to have you sending in my head all the time. Then he told me, ‘You should go do it.’” 

“Mm. An unpleasant task to be completed as soon as possible.” 

“You’re a dear friend, One-Eye. You know that. But–” 

“But...” he nodded. “You’d rather a child with your lifemate, as I’d rather a child with mine.” 

“I don’t think Littlefire can sire cubs,” Kit said. “He... he is too much like the ancient Firstcomers... his mind... I don’t think it could understand Recognition anymore than it understands the rest of the world.” 

“You never know,” One-Eye said lamely. 

“No. You never do. But to tell the truth, One-Eye... it never mattered a great deal to me whether I would have a cub with Littlefire or not. I’m not like Nightfall or Rainsong... I’ve never felt a burning need to have a cub. And I’ve never much enjoyed the prospect of Recognition. Oh, it makes a fine howl, Recognition. Except for the times it is unwanted.” 

One-Eye flinched. “The child we will make is unwanted?” 

“Unasked-for! Timmorn’s blood – even the wolves have more choice than we! A wolf can seek his own mate. A wolf is never... forced!” 

“You know I do not mean to force you, Kit.” 

“No, you do not. And I would rather it be with a trusted tribemate than a stranger...if it must be...” 

“But we are both forced by the bloodsong,” he finished for her. 

“I do not like this bloodsong. It’s a shrill pain in my ears.” Suddenly she looked very young and vulnerable. One-Eye felt his heart go out to her. It wasn’t right. Recognition should be a joyous affair. He at least had the memories of two such joys to comfort him. For all he knew, this would be Kit’s only time, and it brought only sorrow. 

He struggled to find words to comfort her. “I’ve Recognized twice before,” he said slowly. “Sired two fine cubs... and they’ve gone on to have cubs themselves. I have done my share of child-rearing. This... this cub will be yours... and Littlefire’s alone. I... will not interfere.” 

Kit smiled sadly. “No. This cub will be as much yours as mine. We... will find a way to share the child... between the entire tribe.” 

“It’s a small Holt,” he agreed. “There’s no reason we cannot share the burden, and the joy.” 

“With our lifemates,” Kit said pointedly. 

“Exactly.” 

Kit licked her lips nervously, and One-Eye felt a sudden flush. It wasn’t desire. But it was something equally undeniable. A primal need. Like thirst. It had been this way with Clearbrook. But there had been love too. With Kit there was only confusion. His blood burned for her, but his heart ached to his lifemate, alone and crying in their den. 

“One-Eye... can I ask something of you?” 

“Anything.” 

“Do not use my soulname again. Please.” 

Her voice was so pleading, her eyes so filled with fear. He could not help but nod in assent. 

It had to be done quickly. He had to silence the voice screaming “Tayr” in his mind. Then he could return to Clearbrook. Then the trust Recognition had shattered between him and Kit could be rebuilt. 

She was as nervous as he. He could practically see her pulse throbbing at her throat. 

He held out his hand. Kit hesitated, then took it. 

“I... am a little out of practice,” Kit mumbled, blushing. “It’s been ages since I’ve been with anyone but Littlefire.” 

Curiosity overcame him. “But... you and he... do join?” 

Kit risked a shy smile. “Not quite as you do.” She tapped her temple for emphasis. 

For a moment he strained to imagine a lovemaking of sendings, as it surely must have been for the ancient High Ones. For a moment he felt a wolfish flash of jealousy that she would give her soul to a waif like Littlefire and not to him. But then the moment passed and he realized it was just the drug of Recognition. 

“It will be swiftly done,” One-Eye said lamely. 

“Yes,” Kit replied without illusions. 

It was a shaky truce. But Recognition needed little more. 

* * * 

Littlefire was still dozing in bed when Kit climbed back into their den. “Hmph...” he mumbled as she crawled back under the covers. “It over?” 

“Yes.” 

“So you’ve got a cub in you?” 

“Yes.” The same toneless response. 

“Kit?” 

“Yes?” 

“I think I’m going to keep sleeping.” 

Kit closed her eyes tight and bit back a sudden laugh. Or perhaps it was a sob. 

One-Eye returned to his den to find Clearbrook gone. Her leathers and weapons were missing too, and the furs carefully rearranged over the den floor. 

* * * 

Secrets could not be kept in the Evertree. Word of the Recognition spread throughout the Eldertree, and Redlance called an informal council to congratulate the parents-to-be. And if their tribemates found it odd that the newly Recognized pair were sitting well apart from each other on the low hanging tree branches, no one mentioned it. 

“At last!” Moonshade exclaimed. “The Evertree will ring with the laughter of young! A Holt is never truly a home until it has seen the birth of the next generation.” She reached up to touch Kit’s hand. “And you, my daughter, the youngest of us, to bear a cub to our eldest Wolfrider. How mysterious Recognition is!” 

**No reason to it,** Strongbow affirmed, watching One-Eye carefully. **But we must trust its ways.** 

“Our tribe has always been a little small for comfort since Spar left us for good,” Redlance said. “Let us hope this will be the first of many new Recognitions.” 

“There are precious few of us left to Recognize,” One-Eye said cryptically. 

“How are you, my daughter?” Moonshade held Kit’s hand in hers. “Oh, your poor head must be spinning. Nothing will ever be the same for you, now. Ah, I envy the adventures you will have now. I remember when I recognized your father for the first time – I knew I had changed forever.” 

“Kit didn’t need to change,” Littlefire threw back pointedly from his perch. “She was fine the way she was!” 

“It’s never easy, making the adjustment,” Moonshade insisted. “But you and One-Eye have years to learn and understand each other’s differences.” 

“I know One-Eye,” Kit said defensively. “We’ve been friends and tribemates for years.” 

One-Eye got up from his branch and walked over to sit closer to Clearbrook, who had chosen a seat across from the tribe’s healer. Strongbow’s careful scrutiny became a glare. 

**And what’s between you two now?** he sent. 

“Well... it seems Recognition has a plan,” One-Eye said. “It always does.” He smiled fondly at Clearbrook. “Gave me two precious cubs with my lifemate, and now.. it’s chosen to give me a third with an old friend. And though it was unexpected and unsought, I consider a honour to be the sire of our howlkeeper’s cub.” 

**Then you consider your part over?** Strongbow sent. 

**Wyl, please,** Moonshade touched his arm. **Not now.** 

One-Eye shrugged uncomfortably. “I follow Kit’s lead in all things. I’d never ask for more than she’d offer freely.” 

Kit smiled hesitantly. “I was... quite unprepared for this. I suppose most are when Recognition strikes. But now... I think I am beginning to... adjust. As for the cub... I hope we will all take our turns bringing up the next Wolfrider.” 

**Then you and One-Eye...** Moonshade locksent. 

**No, Mother.** 

“I suppose your quest to Blue Mountain will have to wait now,” Redlance said to Clearbrook and One-Eye. 

Clearbrook shrank visibly in her seat. One-Eye looked flustered. His gaze darted to Kit, then back to his lifemate. “Uh... we haven’t yet –” 

**You intend to go off to Blue Mountain and abandon my daughter – your Recognized?** Strongbow sent furiously. 

“Of course... I’ll stay... if Kit wishes...” One-Eye stammered. 

Clearbrook’s face fell. “Lifemate–” 

Kit shook her head. “There’s no reason for you to stay, One-Eye.” 

**No reason?** 

**Father, enough!** Kit snapped in his head. Aloud and for all to hear, she said, “I’m hardly a cub in need of minders. I think One-Eye and Clearbrook should go. The matter of Recognition has been answered. The cub will not be born for two more turns. Time does not stop because someone is caught with child.” 

“Nothing should be decided hastily,” Rainsong offered diplomatically. “Perhaps with time–” 

“The seasons are turning,” Clearbrook said in a whisper. “If we hope to return before the jaws of the white-cold grip the land, we should go now.” 

**And if you and One-Eye meet with disaster?** Strongbow demanded. **You’ve more than your own dream to think!** 

“We are Wolfriders,” Clearbrook said. “We live in the Now, not in the 'What May Be.'” 

“Kit, why aren’t you more concerned about this?” Moonshade whispered to her daughter. 

**You have a responsibility to my daughter, One-Eye,** Strongbow insisted. 

**I don’t need you to tell where my duty lies.** 

**You cannot simply walk away from the bonds of Recognition.** 

“There are no bonds between us!” One-Eye shouted, startling everyone. 

Clearbrook got to her feet and strode away from the circle. One-Eye chased after her. Kit rose from her perch and began to climb the tree in search of Littlefire. Moonshade sighed into the palm of her side. Strongbow looked around, completely baffled. 

“Ever the tactful one,” Redlance sighed. 

* * * 

**Perth,** One-Eye called to his lifemate. **Perth, wait, please.** 

Clearbrook slowed her pace to let him catch up with her. He took her by the shoulders and turned her around to face him. “I meant what I said,” he told her. “There are no bonds between us. Not anymore. The deed is done.” 

“Can you unlearn her soulname? Can she unlearn yours? Then do not tell me there are no bonds between you.” 

“She is not my lifemate. You are.” 

“But if she asked you... you would stay.” 

He furrowed his brow. “If Redlance asked you to stay here... to abandon the quest... you would, wouldn’t you?” 

“That’s not the same!” Clearbrook shoved his hands off him. “And I wouldn’t! I mean to make a brightmetal sword, and I’ll not stop until I have!” 

She turned and began to storm away through the ferns. One-Eye hastened to keep pace. 

“Clearbrook, please–” 

Clearbrook collapsed to the ground with a cry, and tore up handfuls of new growth. “I hate this!” she cried. “I hate this fever in my blood! I hate this confusion. I know I should be happy for you and Kit. I do! And I should be thinking of the tribe. But I cannot think of the tribe now! I cannot feel joy!” 

He knelt down beside her and rubbed her back as she wept. “Beloved...” 

“You have two cubs with me – why wasn’t that enough? I know I’ll never Recognize again – my days of bearing young are far behind me. I’ve accepted it. But to watch you Recognize another – to know you’ll have a cub I cannot claim–” 

“Kit’s cub!” He took her by the shoulders again. “Timmorn’s blood, you know I would have refused if I could have.” 

“I know that!” she wept. “I know I am wrong to rage. This is not the Way. And that makes the pain even worse. But I feel, One-Eye. I feel!” 

“I know! Oh, lifemate, I know.” He embraced her closely. “Believe me... I would have spared you this pain if I could have. If Recognition had to strike our den, I would have gladly borne the grief if you could have been the one to breed new life.” 

“I am lost,” Clearbrook repeated, her voice softer as she spent her angry sobs. “I don’t know why. I can’t begin to explain...” 

“You do not have to. Not with me.” 

He held her until her shoulders no longer shook. At length her tears dried, and she rocked back on her heels. “I am selfish...” she murmured. 

“No, Clearbrook–” 

“I am. I would keep you fast beside me no matter the cost. But it’s wrong. You will be a father again. No matter what any other says, you alone can say where your place is.” 

“At your side, lifemate.” 

“I must go to Blue Mountain. I cannot explain why. I only know... this fever in me will never abate until I see this dream through.” 

“Then go to Blue Mountain,” he told her. “And let me come with you.” 

“What of Kit’s child?” 

“The child won’t be born for another two turns of the seasons.” 

“What if the quest takes longer? Many have doubted metal-work can be so quickly learned.” 

“Then I will see the cub’s birth through whatever sendings Kit chooses to share with me.” He took her hands in his. “But my place is with you. Nothing can alter that.” 

Clearbrook began to weep anew, now out of gratitude. One-Eye’s arms came up around her once more and they held each other tight. 

* * * 

“Take care,” Kit told One-Eye as they clasped hands in farewell. “I want my cub to know his sire... and not just through howls.” 

“Neither of us have any intention of falling afoul of danger,” One-Eye assured her. 

Strongbow maintained a resentful silence as the rest of the farewells were exchanged. When One-Eye glanced at him, his only answer was a stony glare. The meaning was clear enough. If you die and leave my daughter’s cub fatherless, I swear I will hound your spirit across this world forever. 

“I do not see the reason in this quest,” Moonshade told Clearbrook as she offered the gift of new summer leathers. “But I’m sure it will be hot in the forges of Blue Mountain.” 

“Thank you, Moonshade.” Clearbrook glanced at Kit, now returning to her mother’s side. 

**He loves you as ever,** Kit sent to Clearbrook simply. 

**I know. And thank you, Kit. For your blessing.** 

**He’d have followed you without it.** 

There seemed nothing left to say. Still the two travellers lingered apprehensively at the outskirts of the Holt, their Wolfrider blood urging them to stay. Few wolves ever willingly left the pack, and fewer still returned easily. 

Finally they turned and mounted their wolves. Their few supplies were wrapped in the softest hides and strapped to their backs. The lifemates travelled light. 

“Safe journey!” the Wolfriders of the Eldertribe called. “Ayooah Clearbrook! Ayooah One-Eye!” 

One-Eye turned to wave back to them. But Clearbrook kept her eyes to the journey ahead. 

* * * 

The weather was fair and the two travellers made excellent time. Within a few days they had left the familiar surroundings of Holt territory. They followed their small stream until it joined a second stream to become a wide river. On their journey they crossed several more forks in the river, and each time the waterway grew. By times gentle, by times raging with rapids, the river was their guide. They followed it through dense woodlands and empty plains. The elders had to struggle to clearly recall the days of the first quest – the hunt for Swift which first took them to Blue Mountain. But they remember that eventually the faithful river would shatter into countless rapids and waterfalls as it neared the sea. 

“Beyond where the Death Water falls...” Clearbrook murmured to herself. 

After a moon-dance of travel, they entered human territory. They travelled only by night and slept fitfully by day. One-Eye suggested their leave the riverbank. “Surely the humans use the waterway – remember the rafts at Father Tree? If we continue towards Sun-Goes-Down, but a day’s ride south of the river.” 

“No,” Clearbrook shook her head. “No. We stay with the river. It will show us the way. We stay by the river.” 

Clearbrook was forever restless, fidgetting if poor weather or sore feet slowed them down. Watching her out of the corner of his eye, One-Eye wondered if perhaps one could Recognize a dream, and if this was the sickness of Recognition denied. 

“Why a sword?” he asked her one night. 

“It has never been done before. Not by a Wolfrider.” 

“I thought Swift was the Chief of Changes. Since when does my Perth want to blaze a new trail?” 

She shrugged. “I don’t know.” After considering it a moment more, she continued, “Perhaps I want to be more than one leaf on a branch. I... I want to start a new shoot of my own.” 

* * * 

The nights were growing shorter and the dew fell lighter on the ground as they left the plains to return to forest. After two moons of travel they came to the Deathwater Falls. Before them lay the dark woodland of the Forbidden Grove. 

“Blue Mountain used to sit on the horizon there,” One-Eye said. “Still hard to believe... that the old snake could bring a whole mountain done. And that we were there to see it. Easier to think of it as a dream.” 

They found a path down by moonlight, not directly over the falls on vines as Swift and Rayek had done, but along a game trail trodden by deer and small cats away from the water’s spray. By morning they had reached the outer edge of the Forbidden Grove, and they stopped to rest in its dappled shade. One-Eye would have been glad for a nap, but Clearbrook was too nervous to lie down. Their goal was almost in sight. 

They hiked through the grove all afternoon. The sun burned an angry red-gold in their eyes as they finally left the forest behind them and began to climb towards the foothills of the old mountain. They turned north and scrambled over blue-grey boulders. Smaller, worm-shaped bits of rock littering the floor underfoot. 

“Still hard to believe...” One-Eye murmured as he struggled up a natural staircase of bare rock. “Harder still to believe anyone could live here. Would want to live here.” 

“Ayooah!” a chipper voice bounced off the rocks. Clearbrook shaded her eyes from the sun as she looked up the hillside. Shenshen was standing on a rocky ledge above them, waving her arm wildly. The sun glinted off her shiny bodice made entirely of small gold coins. Gold glinted at her throat and topknots, and her hips were encircled by a fine belt set with precious stones. 

“Shade and sweet water!” she called. “Welcome to Blue Mountain!”


	2. Part Two

Shenshen led the two Wolfriders and their mounts down a staircase hidden in the shadows of what appeared to be a natural arrangement of boulders. Only an elf – or a troll – was small enough to fit between the rocks and find the tunnel that Two-Edge had dug into the mountain. 

“It’s wonderful to see you again,” Shenshen chirped. “It’s been much too long – I’ve hardly seen any of the Wolfriders since I left Sorrow’s End with Brightmetal, and I can’t remember the last time I shared a meal with an elf from your Eldertribe.” 

“It’s dark in here,” One-Eye scowled. “Still got sun spots in my eyes.” 

“I hope it’s no bother taking us in like this,” Clearbrook said. 

“Of course. Don’t be silly. We’re glad for the company. Oh, there are never enough moments in the day to do everything – we’re hardly enough bored with all of Two-Edge’s projects to keep us entertained. But with only four of us, we do get a little hungry for a new face. No, don’t think twice, Clearbrook. And tell all your friends to come and see us more often. Especially that funny Littlefire. We would love to see him again. It’s been too long since he came here, and after all, he is Two-Edge’s close kin – and Aroree’s too.” 

Chattering the entire journey, Shenshen led them into the first chamber. Furs hung from the walls on wooden pegs, as did long robes of woven cloth and several woven sun hats. 

“The wolves can sleep here if they’d like,” Shenshen said. “But if you’d rather they stay with you they are welcome to come in and sleep with you in your room. Or if it’s the open air they like, there are lots of overhangs where they could sleep.” 

“This will be fine, Shenshen. Thank you.” 

“We weren’t exactly sure when you would be arriving, so Two-Edge has been making his best stew every night for the last eight-of-days,” she said to explain the mouth-watering aroma as they left the wolves and descended deeper into the cave. “The best woodrot and toadstools... and some fine wildfowl too. Ohh...” she paused as she saw One-Eye’s unenthusiastic expression. “Or if you’d like I’m sure it’s not too late for Aroree to rustle up something fresh.” 

“Whatever you’ve made is fine,” Clearbrook said, giving One-Eye a little nudge in the ribs. “We don’t want to be a bother.” 

“Not at all. I told you, we’re glad for the company.” 

The main chamber held a great stone hearth. A fire was roaring within, over which the stew was bubbling. One-Eye and Clearbrook both stiffened imperceptibly at the sight of the half-troll crouched near the fire, the wolf in them instantly on guard. But Two-Edge only turned and favour them with a timid smile. 

Aroree appeared out of another room, bearing a flagon of wine. “You’re here!” she beamed. “Shenshen, you should have sent. Welcome. Please, sit. You must be tired from your journey. Are you thirsty? This dreamberry wine is from last year’s harvest – very sweet, and without too much of a bite.” 

They sat down around the stone table and Aroree poured out the wine to her guests. “I am so happy you’re here, One-Eye, Clearbrook,” Aroree said. “I’ve longed to have a chance to repay the kindness your tribe showed me so many years ago.” 

“I too,” Two-Edge said. “You... you and your tribe had no reason to take me in after the war with the trolls... but you did. Your healer saved my life then... and he saved the life of my mate and my son years later. I... I always pay my debts. I... the edges must be equally sharpened, you see. The scales must be balanced. If it’s the secrets of the forge you want, my son and I will be glad to teach you.” 

“Where is your son?” Clearbrook inquired politely. 

“Oh, he’ll show his face when the stew is ready,” Aroree laughed lightly. 

Sure enough, when the stew was cooked and Two-Edge was ladling it into bowls Aroree held, the quarter-troll made his appearance, seemingly unfazed by the appearance of two Wolfriders at his table. “One-Eye and Clearbrook, yes? So you’re the Wolfriders who want to learn to forge metal, are you?” 

“Just Clearbrook,” said One-Eye. 

Brightmetal took the bowl of stew Aroree was about to set at Two-Edge’s place and sat down at his own seat next to Shenshen. “What? Oh, shame. You’re letting your mate toil at the forge alone? It’s the male’s duty to forge to metals, the female’s to adorn herself in them.” 

“Brightmetal...” Shenshen touched his shoulder. “Don’t mind him. All these years and he still thinks the only way is the troll way.” 

“I’ve got no head for metalworking,” One-Eye said. “Wouldn’t know where to begin. It’s Clearbrook’s dream to make a brightmetal sword. And it’s my duty to stand by her, no matter what.” 

Brightmetal nodded thoughtfully. “Well. It’s about time one of you wolf-elves decided to take up the trade. They’ve been making fine metalwork in Sorrow’s End for ages.” 

“Hm. Shouldn’t be too hard to teach you the ways of metal,” Two-Edge said. “Few days’ rest and we can take you down to the forges.” 

“I’m ready to begin tomorrow,” Clearbrook announced. 

“You must be tired from your journey,” Aroree said. 

“Not tired enough to kill the hunger inside me.” 

Two-Edge and Brightmetal exchanged skeptical glances. “Very well,” Two-Edge said at length. “Tomorrow.” 

“Tell me everything that’s happened at Redmark’s Rest,” Shenshen begged excitedly. “Oh, I know the Way doesn’t hold much with change, but I can’t believe nothing new has happened. Any new quests? New human tribes found? Recognitions?” 

Clearbrook winced. One-Eye looked down at his plate. “Actually... there... will be a new cub in another two turns of the season.” 

“Oh, how wonderful,” Aroree exclaimed. 

“Who?” Shenshen demanded. 

“Uh... Kit–” 

“And Littlefire? Well, it’s about time–” 

“And... me,” One-Eye said. 

“Oh.” Shenshen fell silent. 

“How lovely for you,” Aroree said. “You’ll have a cub waiting for you when you and Clearbrook return home.” 

“Well... we hope to be home before then,” One-Eye began. 

“But we’ll stay here as long as it takes,” Clearbrook added hastily. 

“Yes...” 

Again Two-Edge and Brightmetal glanced at each other askance. 

* * * 

The Wolfriders slept in the guest room – Aroree explained that they always kept a spare room in case visitors came by. The bed was huge – clearly built to a Glider’s height, not a Wolfriders. One-Eye gratefully burrowed under the furs, but Clearbrook lingered on her feet, watching the wood crackle in the flames of their hearth. 

**Come to bed, Perth,** One-Eye sent wearily. **Morning will come soon enough.** 

* * * 

Clearbrook’s education began in earnest come morning. She struggled to lift the heavy hammer, and blanched when Brightmetal cheerfully informed her it was the smallest one they had. She strained her eyes to see the different veins of metal that ran in the rock. She coughed at the soot and ash in the air. 

The first days were spent showing her about the forge, explaining the purpose of each tool. Clearbrook’s head spun from all the new vocabulary. 

After Clearbrook could name every tool and its purpose, they showed her how to hold a pick axe and mine the rock directly from the tunnel around her. After her hands were covered with blisters from hefting the great pick, they melted the rocks she had chipped away, demonstrating how some molten stone floated in the great crucible while other ores sank. 

“That yellow rock must always been removed from the ore to make brightmetal,” Two-Edge warned her. “It will make your blade brittle.” 

“The metal sinks straight to the bottom,” Brightmetal told her. “You can break the bowl open to get at the shards of metal, but it’s better if you build a spout in the bottom of the bowl to drain out the molten metal.” 

“Strong clay will do the trick,” Two-Edge added. 

Clearbrook was at a loss more often than not. But she could still impress her hosts with her own special skills. “There are three kinds of metal here,” she told them as she sniffed the brightmetal blade Two-Edge showed her. “But... but I don’t know what kinds... or in what measures.” 

“Patience...” Two-Edge told her again and again when she wanted to race ahead. “I can tell you the metals are greymetal, hardflint and blacksheen, but until you know them from the rocks around, they are only names.” 

“Ohhh... this isn’t working,” Clearbrook moaned as One-Eye massaged her aching shoulder muscles. “I’m never going to be any good at this.” 

“Hold still,” One-Eye chided gently. 

“I won’t give up,” Clearbrook insisted. 

“No one says you have to. But try to take it slow. You don’t have to make a sword by the next eight-of-days.” 

* * * 

“Here,” Shenshen said at supper after two-eights-of-days, when Clearbrook could not longer hide the pain in her muscles. She held out a ceramic container of a smelly green ointment. “It’s made from grubbing moss – I know it smells horrible, but it will take the pain out of your shoulders at night and give you new strength in the morning.” 

Clearbrook smiled in gratitude. “What do you with your days, Shenshen? Aroree hunts and weaves the cloth you all wear. Two-Edge and Brightmetal stand at the forges. What about you?” 

Shenshen shrugged. “A little bit of everything, really.” 

“Don’t be so modest,” Aroree said. “She is our best gatherer – she finds the best mushrooms and mosses for our stews and pies. And her herb lore keeps us all strong. We have no healer’s magic here, but Shenshen’s mended many broken bones and cured many fevers over the years.” 

“It’s so good to feel... useful,” Shenshen confessed to Clearbrook later that evening as they sat by the hearth, warming their hands. “At Sorrow’s End... even at the Great Holt... I felt so much like one of many. Oh... I was useful. I was another pair of hands. But there was nothing special I had to offer... save for those rare times when I could help at a birth. Even then, you Wolfriders could take care of yourselves, more oft than not. Most of the time... I could just as easily be replaced by another pair of hands. But here... no one could replace me. Here I have something all my own to give. And that’s why you’re here, isn’t it?” 

Clearbrook smiled. “I think it is.” She reached over and squeezed Shenshen’s hand. 

* * * 

The next morning, Shenshen passed Clearbrook and the two smiths at the forge. “And where are you off to so cheerful, Shen?” Brightmetal teased. 

“Looking for some more grubbing mosses and roundroot. From the way you’re working poor Clearbrook, I imagine I’ll need it.” 

“Look,” Clearbrook held up the tiny sliver of brightmetal she had made with the metal tongs. “Hardly a sword, I know, but a good beginning.” 

“All things grow from good beginnings,” Shenshen grinned. “I’ll see if I can’t find a little blakeroot too while I’m down in the Southern Maze. Fry up some fish for a proper celebration tonight.” 

“Just leave a few raw ones for One-Eye,” Clearbrook said. “He can’t stand cooked fish.” 

“We’ll turn his taste to proper cooking yet!” Shenshen threw over her shoulder. 

“Be mindful, daughter!” Two-Edge called. “There were tremors in the Southern Maze a few days ago... the ground may still be shifting.” 

“Don’t worry. I know these caves like a troll now.” 

Shenshen left them behind in the forge and skipped down the steps to the lower levels of Blue Mountain. The light of her glowing stone lantern revealed the many structures of the Gliders that had survived Blue Mountain’s fall. The great staircase was rock-shaped, not hewn with a troll’s pick. The walls were decorated with elegant organic swirls that not only pleased the senses but also held the ceiling well fortified above the floor. 

Deeper still she returned to the cleanly mined tunnels of Two-Edge’s own design. She followed it past two intersections of smaller tunnels, to its terminus above a deep shaft in the rock. 

Reaching Two-Edge’s elevator built of ropes and wooden pulleys, Shenshen descended to the bottom of the shaft. A smaller, narrow tunnel led deeper into the mountainside. Shenshen set her glowing rock down and knelt on the roughly hewn floor. Tubers poked through the rocks, their stems covered with brown fuzz. Shenshen smiled as she began to carefully pry out the fleshy stalks for her herb basket. 

She sang to keep herself company, and her voice echoed in the close confines: 

“When I was a young troll I had brave ambitions 

To murder my uncle, his treasure to win. 

But he was the stronger, he laughed at my folly. 

He'll die of old age, his gold buried with him.” 

“So we hack and we hew with our picks in the stone 

For the treasures we take from our old mother's bones. 

No joy will we know 'til that treasure we hold, 

For troll maiden's love is as true as your gold. 

Ohh... a troll maiden’s love is a true as your gold...” 

She heard a strange noise over her shoulder. The wind whistling through the tiny fissures that ran throughout the rock? 

It sounded almost like a murmuring. 

It was growing louder. 

Surely just the cave breathing. Her imagination was getting carried away, that was all. 

She tried to sing again, to drown out the moaning, mumbling sounds. “So we hack and we hew... with our picks in the stone... for the treasures we take from our old mother’s bones...” 

The murmurs were growing louder. 

“Who’s there?” Shenshen called. 

The noise only rose. “Mmmmmmmrrrrrrrrrrr.......” 

“I know you’re there! Who are you?” 

“MMMMMMRRRRRRRRR....” 

The rocks around her were vibrating. She could feel the tunnel wall shiver against her hand as she braced herself against it. 

“Oh... Great sun...” she moaned. She looked about desperately. 

The whole tunnel seemed ready to collapse around her as it hummed in tune with the noises. “Got to get out...” Shenshen murmured. “Out... out... oh great sun!” 

She dropped the basket and bolted. She sprinted back up the tunnel and hauled herself onto the elevator’s platform. She yanked hard on the release cord and the hidden rock counterweight sent the platform rising towards the familiar corridors. The echoes of the moaning chased her up the shaft. 

**Brightmetal! Two-Edge! Help me!** her sendings raced ahead of her as barrelled up the staircase bound for the forges. **There’s something down there!** 

“Hey, whoa, Shenshen,” Brightmetal appeared at the top of the stairs, and she tackled him with such force he staggered back, almost falling over. “Hey, hey, what is it?” he smoothed her hair back as she wept against his shoulder. “What’s wrong?” 

“There’s something down there,” Shenshen repeated. 

“What?” 

“I don’t know. I don’t know! Voices! Mumbling... moaning... I didn’t see their faces... but there are... creatures down there!” 

“Shhh... it’s all right. It was probably just the cave breathing–” 

“I know what a breathing cave sounds like!” she snapped defensively. 

Now Two-Edge and Clearbrook joined them at the top of the stairs, and Shenshen sobbed out her story. 

“What do you think, Father?” Brightmetal asked Two-Edge. “Another quake? Aftershocks of rocks settling.” 

“I’m telling you, there’s something down there!” 

“One good way to find out what’s what,” Clearbrook said. 

She called for One-Eye and the wolves, while Two-Edge sent to Aroree, and the party descended the staircase, Shenshen leading the way. She took them through the rock-shaped corridors and the troll-hewn tunnels to the elevator platform above the shaft. 

“Here... down in the tunnel below,” Shenshen explained. “It started while I was picking blakeroot, and then it chased me up the elevator. Dreadful mumblings.” 

“What set them off?” Clearbrook asked. 

“I don’t know.” 

“Well... there’s one sure way to announce ourselves, I reckon,” One-Eye said. He tipped his head back and howled. Clearbrook joined in, as did their two wolves. Shenshen flinched and clung to Brightmetal’s side as the song bounded off the walls. 

They waited for a response. 

And waited. 

And waited. 

One-Eye sighed at length, breaking the tense silence. 

“I know what I heard!” Shenshen cried. 

“Calmly, Shenshen,” Aroree said. “We believe you. Come... let’s go have some tea... we’ll sort this out.” 

“What if whatever’s down there comes up after us? We have to... we have to seal the tunnel... or post a guard... or...” 

“Shh. You’re overwrought. Patience. We’ll sort this out in time.” 

The Lord and Lady of Blue Mountain led Shenshen back to the hearth and prepared her a hot herbal tea. But Shenshen would not be pacified by warm drink. She continued to brood, her shoulders occasionally shaking with fear. 

**What do you suppose she heard?** One-Eye asked Clearbrook. 

**Who can say? These caves are full of noises that sound strange to my ears.** 

**Probably wind moaning through a new fissure opened in the rock since the last tremor,** Two-Edge decided when Clearbrook asked him in sending. 

“You believe me, don’t you?” Shenshen asked Brightmetal as he draped a warm shawl over her shoulders. 

“Oh... Shen... I’m sure you think you heard something...” 

She shrugged the shawl off her shoulders and stalked away. 

* * * 

Clearbrook returned to the forges with Brightmetal the next day, while Two-Edge took his pick to explore the Southern Maze, much to Shenshen’s horror. “You mustn’t go down there,” Shenshen begged. “It’s too dangerous.” 

He smiled gently. “I’ve roamed these tunnels since before your parents were born, dear daughter. Blue Mountain keeps no secrets from me. I’ll be in no danger. You’ll see.” 

Two-Edge disappeared all day, but when he returned in the evening, he had nothing to report other than one tunnel cave-in and a new fissure opened up far beneath the tunnel where Shenshen had heard the sounds. 

“I’m not a child,” Shenshen insisted angrily when Two-Edge and Brightmetal sought to calm her. “I know the difference between the sounds a cave makes and... and the sounds something else makes! Why won’t you believe me?” 

“We believe you–” Aroree began. 

“No, you don’t! You think I’m just imagining things – that I heard air hissing through the rocks and lost my head. You think because I wasn’t born here, I don’t know how to get around in these rocks. But you heard the sound, I’ve shared the sending with all of you! Do you really think it’s just air!” 

“It’s gnawing at my gut, that’s for sure,” One-Eye said to Clearbrook in private. “Maybe... maybe it would be better if we go back to the Grove for a few days... sleep under the sky like real Wolfriders... clear our heads.” 

“Whatever Shenshen did or did not hear... the answer won’t be found outside.” 

“You think only of your dream of making a sword,” One-Eye said gently. 

The days passed. Clearbrook returned to work, chipping rocks from the walls around her and melting them in the clay crucible to watch the heavier greymetal ore drain out into the pan. One-Eye was frequently at her side, mopping the sweat from her brow and bringing her cold water to quench her thirst. Aroree hunted for fresh food as always. But Shenshen refused to venture into the tunnels below the forges, and spent most of her days up in her room, embroidering her freshly-woven belts, and brooding about the nightmares that dogged her dreams. 

“Come on, be a sword!” Clearbrook urged, hammering on the slab of brightmetal as it glowed white-hot. “No!” she cried as it broke into two pieces. Brightmetal smiled indulgently and picked up the broken pieces to heat over the fire again. 

“We’ll start again. It’s easy enough. Just remember to breathe, will you? You elves...” he grumbled under his breath. “You get all riled-up over nothing.” 

“I can’t go back into the Southern Maze,” Shenshen murmured to Brightmetal one night as they lay together in bed. “I just can’t!” 

“Shh... it’s all right, Shenshen. You know I’ll always take care of you.” 

“I don’t need to be taken care of...” Shenshen whispered long after he had fallen asleep. 

* * * 

“Are you thinking of Kit and the child you will share?” Aroree asked One-Eye one afternoon as she took note of his pensiveness. 

“Yes. Though I would hate to admit it to Clearbrook.” 

“Why?” 

“It would only hurt her to know where my thoughts take me.” 

“I’m sure she knows.” Aroree leaned across the stone table to take his hand. “I know what it is like to fear the loss of a lifemate’s love.” 

“Clearbrook shouldn’t fear – wait... you? When did you ever have cause to doubt Two-Edge’s love?” One-Eye seemed genuinely perplexed. “I’ll admit... I never saw it coming, but you two seem as perfectly fashioned for each other as.... well... as I could imagine.” 

Aroree nodded. “Never had I known such joy before Two-Edge came into my life. My life before... is lost in a fog of painful memories. No... but there was a time... a short time... when I feared his love for another might... lessen the bonds we shared.” 

“Love for whom?” 

“Our son.” 

One-Eye stared at her, uncomprehending. 

“I always knew Two-Edge wanted a child more than anything... and when I first realized I was with child... I was so happy. But as time passed... I began to fear that Two-Edge loved me not for myself... but as a vessel for his future child. I feared... I thought then that love was something to be carved up and portioned out, and to love Brightmetal he would have to turn from me. And in my darker moments I hated the child growing inside me.” She shook her head. “I was such a fool.” 

“Did... did you ever tell Two-Edge?” 

“In the end, I did not have to. He knew. And when I realized how well he knew my own secret shame, and when I held my son in my arms... I knew nothing could weaken the bonds between us.” 

“It’s different with us...” One-Eye said. “The child... Kit... even Littlefire... there are suddenly three more elves in our family. How can I promise Clearbrook that we are still lifemates as if nothing has changed?” 

Aroree smiled sadly. “You can’t promise her that. Everything changes. Every day.” 

* * * 

“Come on... come on!” Clearbrook urged as she beat on the brightmetal, slowly shaping it into a long straight blade with a triangular tip. 

She worked alone in the forge. Two-Edge and Brightmetal had left her, Two-Edge to tend the hearth fire and prepare supper, Brightmetal to seek a refuge from what her called her “exhausting” obsession. He doubtlessly expected her to give in for the day once the metal once again failed to cooperate. But this time the hammer struck true. This time the sword was coming to life. 

She plunged the blade deep into the water and drew in a sharp breath as the steam billowed up around her face. When the steam cleared, she pulled the blade back out. Twice before the metal had splintered when it cooled suddenly. Twice before she had come so close only to fail again. 

She held the blade up to the light. It was solid. 

**Sur! Come quickly!** The sending spurred One-Eye into the forges at a fast sprint. Clearbrook’s voice soundly so urgent in his head, yet also so joyous. He found Clearbrook tentatively weighing the cooling blade in her hand. 

One-Eye beamed with pride. “You’ve done what no Wolfrider has ever done!” 

“It’s not finished yet,” Clearbrook said. “Still needs a proper handle hilt...” 

“Still – this is the beginning of a new day for us!” 

* * * 

As Clearbrook and One-Eye quietly rejoiced in the forge, Brightmetal was trying to seek reconciliation between his own lifemate and her lingering fears of the caverns below. Shenshen still refused to descend below the forges. Dark circles ringed her eyes from lack of sleep. Her tongue had grown sharp from arguments with Brightmetal. 

Aroree told him to be patient, but he was growing increasingly uncomfortable with her irrational fears. Something needed to be done, or Shenshen would waste away in her rooms. The best way to face a fear was to confront it. His father had always taught him so. 

“Looks like ol’ Clearbrook might have that sword made sooner than we thought,” he remarked as he followed Shenshen on her root-gathering. “Father wants to make a nice meat pie to celebrate. Little premature, I think.” 

“Mm-hm.” 

“Nothing like blakeroot to season a good meat-and-mushroom pie,” Brightmetal remarked as casually as he could. 

Shenshen’s hands clenched tight on the basket. “Don’t,” she said. 

“What?” 

“I’m not a fool, Brightmetal. I won’t be played like one.” 

“Aw, Shen....” Embarrassed, he rubbed the back of his neck. “I’m trying... I just wish you’d let me in a little. Let me help you.” 

“There’s nothing you can do. Just... let it go.” 

“You can’t keep living in fear.” 

“This isn’t a fever you can dose with the right root.” 

He touched her arm. “Look... just come with me to the Southern Maze. You can help me pick the best tubers – you know I can never be trusted to find one with the right mould on it. And I can show you that’s nothing to be afraid of.” 

“No.” 

“Shen–” 

“You still don’t believe me! You still think I’m some hysterical child!” 

“I... don’t know what you heard. I don’t know what’s got you so scared–” 

“I sent! I showed you!” 

“I know. And I know it’s got you shaken. So I thought – look. Why don’t we go down the lift to the Southern Maze? If there is anything down there, I’ll be there with you. And if there’s nothing... then maybe you can see you’ve no reason to be –” 

“Augh!” Shenshen cried, throwing up her hands. “It’s like talking to a wall!” 

“It’s not exactly easy figuring you out lately! I swear you’re trying to–” 

“Do you think this is an act? Great sun, what will it take for you to believe me?” 

“Shen–” he reached for her hand. 

“No!” She stumbled back, shrinking from his touch. 

“Just–” Again he reached for her, and again she pulled away. “Shen – how can I help you if you don’t–” 

“Just forget it!” Shenshen cried, turning her back to her. “Forget it!” She ran down the hallway, bound for the reaches below the mountain. 

“Shenshen – where are you–” 

“Away from you!” she shouted back as she disappeared into the darkness. 

Brightmetal watched her flee. He paced restlessly, muttering curses under his breath. There was no reasoning with her when she was in a bad mood. And he was an eminently reasonable troll, he imagined. Try as he might, he could never predict the completely illogical tangents her fancies took her. 

He was better off letting her go. She didn’t want to see him, and he certainly didn’t want to deal with her in such a state. Left alone, she cool her heels in some dark corridor. She would come back, all haughty indignation. He’d play the lovable empty-headed fool, and she accept his apologies, even if they both knew he had no idea why he was asking forgiveness. Life would go on. 

It was the reasonable thing to do. 

But she was wounded by a far graver hurt than their usual spats caused. And she had been known to get herself lost in the twisted caves. 

And there was still the matter of those strange sounds... in truth unlike any gasping air flow he had ever heard before. 

“Slugscat,” he moaned as he set off after her. 

* * * 

Shenshen ran blindly down the corridors. Phosphorescent moss lit her way as she stumbled in the gloom, taking one turn, then another. She tripped, scrambled back to her feet, and then ran on. She sobbed and gasped for breath. When she couldn’t run any further, she collapsed to the rock and wept angrily. She hated him. She hated his trollish arrogance, his condescending smiles. She hated his reasonableness. Why had she ever agreed to be his lifemate? He did not see her as an equal. He saw her as an ornament, a living doll – nothing more. He even dressed her as a troll’s doll. She sniffed and wiped her nose as she looked down at her garments scornfully. A golden collar, a breastplate of gold coins, a finely woven belt laced through gold rings at her waist. She might as well have been a lovetoy of the ancient troll tyrants Greymung and Guttlekraw. He didn’t trust her. Didn’t believe her... 

Shenshen coughed and choked on her tears. Gradually her rage passed, and Shenshen began to think clearly again. Brightmetal wasn’t to blame. It was not that he did not trust her, or that he counted her thoughts less than his. He just did not have the capacity to imagine any unknown intruding into the cheerful shell he had built around his family. The notion of undiscovered creatures... or Old Magic reawakened, beneath his very home was simply preposterous to him. To admit even the possibility would be to admit he hadn’t nearly the control over his own life he claimed. 

But she knew what she had heard. 

After she had cried out the last of her anger, she rose and wandered down the tunnel at a more measured pace. She’d stay away just long enough for Brightmetal to start worrying about her. Then she would go back and sit him down for a proper conversation. Brightmetal was a good soul, but every few years his cheerful arrogance needed to be properly checked. They had quarrels like this every few years. She doubted Brightmetal would ever change. But these occasional frustrations were a small price to pay for such a devoted lifemate. And as soon as he rage wore off, she always remembered that the only reason she could hate him so much in one moment was because she loved him so dearly. 

She followed the tunnel to a great staircase, then descended into a large chamber, an old hall once used by the ancient Gliders. The remembered the room vaguely. Brightmetal and Two-Edge had once worked to reinforce old walls and prevent a cave-in. But otherwise they had left it alone. The thin soil that clung to the cracks in the rock was too sterile for underground growth, and Shenshen had seldom had a reason to visit the old crypt. The many doorways that stood at compass points throughout the room led only to collapsed mine shafts. 

She saw an old block of hewn stone in the center of the room. She sat down and looked at the worn patterns in the stone. A Glider rockshaper must have separated the darker rock from the lighter to create a flowing design across the floor. 

She heard a rumbling sound in the distance. 

“It’s nothing...” Shenshen whispered to herself. 

She was trembling. She rose from the block and touched her hand to the stone floor. No... the floor was trembling. 

“rrrrrrr....” growled the stone. 

Shenshen slowly began to back away from the empty black doorways, towards the safety of the staircase and the forges far above. 

“Mmmmrrrrr....” 

“It’s nothing...” Shenshen breathed. “Just rock settling. Another aftershock, that’s all....” 

“Shennnnsssheeeennnnnn!” Brightmetal’s voice boomed off the rocks. 

The growl became a roar. The ground shook underfoot. Shenshen turned and bolted for the stairs as it seemed the very walls of the crypt closed around her. 

“Brightmetal!” She ran towards his voice. She reached the base of the stairs and saw him standing high above her. “Brightmetal – we have to get out of here–” 

Even as she spoke, she saw the walls shake around him. A boulder came tumbling down from the ceiling over his head, and she screamed. Brightmetal ducked, stumbling down the steps as more rocks rained down from a fissure in the ceiling. 

“Brightmetal – jump!” Shenshen screamed as he outran the stones crashing down the steps. One rock clipped his hip, and he fell. Inertia took over as he tumbled the rest of the way to the base of the steps. 

“Beloved!” Shenshen raced to his side. “Are you all right?” 

“Unhh, well enough....” Brightmetal moaned, getting to his feet. “It stopped, at least. We’ll just have to find another way–” 

The moaning caught up with them. The entire chamber echoed with shambling footfalls and incoherent murmurs, punctuated by the scrape of metal chains against rock. Horror-struck, Brightmetal turned to face the phantoms that had haunted Shenshen’s dreams. 

Trolls. Dozens of drooling, stumbling, dead-eyed trolls. Armed to the teeth and slowly advancing upon them.


	3. Chapter 3

Kit stretched out on the furs of her bower, smiling at the afternoon sun slanting through the trees. She ought to pull herself out of bed and get moving. There was always work to be done as new-green began to turn to longsun. But she felt too deliciously weary to move. Perhaps she would simply claim the growing life inside was draining her strength. 

Littlefire lay with his ear to her belly, as if expecting to hear the cub’s heartbeat. Kit and Rainsong both had already explained it was still too early for the cub to be felt by anyone beyond mother and healer. But as with all admonitions, her lifemate paid it little heed. 

Kit giggled as a stray lock of his hair tickled her navel. Littlefire shushed her. 

“What are you doing?” she finally asked. 

“Sending,” came his distracted reply. 

“The cub can’t hear your sendings yet, Wesh. He’s still too little.” 

“Course she can,” he mumbled. “Why do you keep calling her ‘him’?” 

Kit propped herself up on her elbows. “It’s a girl?” 

“’Course.” 

“H-how do you know?” 

“She told me.” 

“The cub can’t send yet. He – she’s – no bigger than a little pebble. If that!” 

“No. Can’t send yet. But she told me. Not sending, but something else. Mmnnh!” he blew the air out through his lips angrily as he often did when he could not express himself. “Can’t send yet. But she can listen. I want her to get used to my sendings. S-so she’s not afraid of them.” 

Kit smiled indulgently. Sometimes even she could never quite figure out what Littlefire was trying to say. But she couldn’t argue with his reasoning. 

He rose on his elbows, then shifted on the furs so he lay down next to her. He wrinkled his nose. “You smell different,” he told her. 

“You have a nose to put a Wolfrider to shame. I suppose you can scent the cub in me.” 

He nodded gravely. 

“Does it bother you?” 

“Yes,” he said bluntly. “I want you to smell like you again.” 

“I mean the cub... coming into our lives like this... unasked for.” 

He gave it serious thought. “Yes. But... it’s not important. I... y-you bother me. Y-you make everything all muddled and complicated. But I like you. The cub will muddle everything. But I like her too. I think.” 

“You’ll make a good father, Littlefire.” 

“No!” He drew back suddenly. “No – no – no... don’t want that. Don’t – too much. One-Eye’s the father. He’s got to do it. I’d make a muddle of it.” He thought about it a moment. “No. Not a father. I couldn’t. Could... I be something else?” 

She touched his cheek. “You can be whatever you wish to be to this child.” 

“I could be a Cheipar,” Littlefire decided. “I think I could do that.” 

“Elder brother, then.” 

They lay in silence for a time, before Littlefire asked, “Bothers you?” 

Kit was surprised by the question. He was unusually perceptive today. Normally such subtleties buried in her speech were lost to him. 

“I thought it would. I... didn’t look for it. Didn’t want it – and hated that I should want it. Hated that cursed Recognition. But now... I think I’m getting used to the idea.” 

She winced. “What’s wrong?” Littlefire asked. 

“Don’t know...” Kit murmured. “Something... something just didn’t feel right for a moment.” 

* * * 

“Get behind me, Shen!” Brightmetal shouted as he swung out with his sword wildly, trying to block hurled stones and whiplashing chains. 

“What’s wrong with them?” Shenshen howled as she sought refuge behind his broad shoulders. The trolls were steadily driving them back up the stairs towards the sealed tunnel. They were trapped, and they both knew it. Still Brightmetal fought to shield his lifemate from their chains, and their greedy grasping hands. 

“Treasure....” the trolls moaned. “Treasure...” 

“Get back!” Brightmetal roared. “I am Brightmetal – son of Two-Edge, the Master Smith! We are lords of this mountain. You will obey me!” 

The trolls gave no indication they understood his speech as they pressed the lifemates into the trap. They gurgled and drooled and pressed on, their sheer numbers overwhelming Brightmetal’s sword arm. 

“I told you there were trolls in the tunnels!” Shenshen screamed over the mumbling. 

Brightmetal struggled with the chain now wrapped about his wrist. “What do you want, you mindless–” 

“I told you!” 

“Shenshen... love... I – agh – appreciate that – but could you just – back, you! – SHUT UP for a minute?” 

The sea of sweaty trolls overwhelmed them. Brightmetal’s sword was torn from his hands. As he teetered off-balance, the trolls pushed him aside roughly to advance on Shenshen. She screamed as calloused hands began to tug and tear at her clothing. 

“Brightmetal!” 

“Get your hands off my lifemate, you filthy savages–” 

Shenshen kicked and scratched. But the trolls were merciless. They tore the gold ornaments from her hair. They ripped the gold hoops from her skirt and yanked her golden breastplate off with such force the clasps tore her skin. They stripped her half-naked as she fought them. But once she was left in tatters of simple cloth, the attack ended. Shenshen was left bruised on the steps, desperately trying to cover herself as the trolls turned on the restrained Brightmetal. 

“It’s our metal they want!” Brightmetal managed to shout. The trolls were swarming him. In mere moments he was divested of his golden collar and his metal wrist-bracers. Then he was bound with the heavy chains. Shenshen tried to scramble to her feet. But with Brightmetal now subdued, the trolls had remembered her. The chain lashed out, and Shenshen fell back to the stone steps. 

* * * 

“Something’s wrong!” Aroree fretted as they sat around the stone table. “Brightmetal and Shenshen should have returned by now.” 

Two-Edge covered her hand with his. “Shenshen ran off full of steam. I hope she did not get herself lost in the mazes.” 

“Can you send?” One-Eye asked. 

“They must be out of range. Every time I try... nothing.” 

Clearbrook shrugged. She could not share Aroree’s worries. The disappearance of her part-time tutor and his lifemate could have any number of causes, all equally innocuous. Her sword held more fascination, as she carefully sharpened it on the whetstone. 

“Maybe they wanted a little time alone,” she suggested. “Together.” 

Aroree shook her head. “I don’t think so. There are precious few places in the caves exactly... welcoming for games of love.” 

“You just need some imagination.” 

“No. Something’s happened. I can feel it.” 

One-Eye chewed his lip thoughtfully. “Can’t say I like it. What with Shenshen wound so tight... and those noises we still haven’t been able to place. My hackles are up too.” 

Clearbrook wound the wrapping over the hilt of her blade. “I say they’re probably gnawing a bone between them. Don’t fret, Aroree. They’ll be back in time for supper. That son of yours never misses a good meal.” 

One-Eye shook his head. “Something just doesn’t feel right.” 

* * * 

“You know sending’s no good down here,” Shenshen told her lifemate as he pressed his eyes tightly closed and tried to send his thoughts into the aether. “We’re too far down.” 

Exhausted, Brightmetal opened his eyes. “I know...” He looked up at the sheers wall of the chasm down which the trolls had dropped them. They had easily shrugged off the heavy chains once left alone. But the walls of their deep pit were perfectly smooth, and nearly perpendicular to the floor. They would never climb out without help. 

The trolls had lost all interest in them once they had taken their gold and brightmetal. Shenshen had managed to salvage her woven belt and crisscrossed it over her chest as a flimsy halter. Brightmetal massaged his sore arms and winced at the bruises already rising on his biceps. All in all, they had escaped lightly. If only they could escape from the pit. 

“Have they come back at all?” Brightmetal asked. 

Shenshen shook her head. She stared up at the lip of the chasm high above them, almost lost in the gloom. “What do you think they want?” 

“Gold, for one. Brightmetal – any metal, by the looks of things.” He looked down at his tattered tunic. “They took everything that wasn’t shiny.” He gave her a crooked smile. “At least they weren’t interested in what they found after the gold came off. Guess you were too skinny for their taste.” 

Shenshen hugged her chest, shivering in the cool air. She tried to jest. “Thanks High Ones for small mercies.” 

“Cursed glassy-eyed things – they didn’t seem to see anything besides the metal. It’s like their brains... all their senses rotted away. Shen...” he took in her shivering, her fear. “I’m so sorry. This is all my fault. If I had listened to you....” Words failed him, and instead he held out his arms. She ran to him gratefully. They sank back to the ground together, holding each other tightly. “We’ll get out of this,” he told her. “You’ll see. Father will find us... get us out of this mess.” 

“How will he find us?” 

“Aww... between him and Mother, they’ll be worried sick about us by now. Won’t be long before they start searching... they’re bound to get within sending range sooner or later.” 

“They’re bound to...” Shenshen repeated tonelessly. 

They heard scuffling in the darkness high above them. They looked up at the shadowed edge of the pit. 

“Skinnies...” called a slurred voice above them. 

“Watch who you’re calling ‘skinny!’” Brightmetal growled, getting to his feet. “Come down here and face me like a real troll, misfit! I’ll show you how a Prince of Blue Mountain fights!” 

“You... have... treasure...” the voice called down. 

“We had. Until you took it, you filthy thieves! I want my sword back!” 

“Now... we have... treasure.” 

“Wormwater you do! Do you have any idea who I am?” 

“Skinny... troll...” 

“I am Brightmetal! Son of Two-Edge, the Master Smith! Lord of Blue Mountain! Bane of Guttlekraw!” 

“Guttle-kraw?” 

“Oh, you remember him, do you? Well, my father brought down his entire kingdom once! You think he can’t handle a few misfit trolls? You let me and my mate go, or by Guttlekraw’s skull, my father will settle things with you!” 

“Smith?” 

“Yep, that’s right! Master Smith!” 

“You... smith?” 

“So I am!” Brightmetal shouted, full of bravado. “And Heir to Blue Mountain. So you think about what it means to kidnap a troll of royal blood – you scum-sucking wart!” 

The unseen troll laughed. It was a sickening sound, more akin to air gurgling in a flooded windpipe. “Good. Smith. You make us treasure.” 

“What? I will not! I’m nobody’s slave! You let us go, or I swear–” 

“You make us treasure!” the misfit troll ordered. “We... masters... here.” 

With that vaguely coherent threat, the troll shuffled away, leaving Brightmetal and Shenshen alone in their prison. 

* * * 

The candles had burned down to pools of melted fat. Dark shadows crept into the corners of the room, and even Clearbrook began to grow nervous. Supper had been cooked, forgotten, and cooled on the table before them. It was growing late indeed. 

“I can’t stand it any longer,” Aroree said, springing up from the table. “If I’m wrong and they’ve snuck off to be alone, I’ll glad be laughed at.” 

“Maiden!” Two-Edge called, but Aroree was already flying down the tunnel towards the forges. Two-Edge seized up his hammer and hastened after her. One-Eye looked to Clearbrook. Now she looked up with equal concern in her eyes. She nodded. 

“It might be a mother’s baseless fear,” he said. “But my gut tells me to trust her. And if Shenshen was right...” 

Clearbrook rose, examining her blade. “I used to dream of chasing shadows through Blue Mountain, sword in hand. I thought... Kit thought... I was dreaming of the past. Perhaps I was dreaming of the yet-to-be.” 

“We don’t know the danger yet,” One-Eye said. “But there’s no better time than now to give that sword a good beginning.” 

Clearbrook gave the sword a testing swing. “It feels good to have one in my hand again.” 

* * * 

**Brightmetal!** Aroree sent desperately as she flitted down the corridors. **Brightmetal, son, answer me!** 

“Aroree!” Two-Edge caught up with her and took her by the arms as she tried to dart down another passageway. “Wait! Slow down – you’ll never find him like this. There are countless tunnels under the mountain. You know that.” 

“He’s in trouble, Two-Edge!” she wept. Exhausted, her legs gave out beneath her, and she dropped to her knees. “I know! I can feel it! He’s hurt... or trapped... or – I don’t know! But he’s in trouble. Or he would be here. He’d never stay down in the depths without telling us. He knows better than that.” 

“Call on the Palace. As we’ve done before. Even a world away, the Master’s power can lend us the strength–” 

“Oh, Two-Edge – I cannot think straight. My thoughts could never reach it–” 

He took her tiny hands in his. “Then I will lend you my strength, beloved.” 

He bent his head to hers and they touched brows. His clumsy sending powers added to hers, their thoughts stretched out into the depths of the mountain, battering against the empty air in search of a reply. 

For long moments, nothing. Then a faint reply. 

**....Mother – ** 

**Brightmetal!** they redoubled their efforts, their combined sending growing stronger as Aroree was fortified by the sound of his voice. **Brightmetal – what has happened? Where are you?** 

** – Trolls – ...dozen... – caught... can’t... misfit... rotten... help....** 

**Are you hurt?** 

**– No... not... just... bruised... cold....** 

**Shenshen?** 

**....Here... she... right... should... listened to... her...** 

**We’re coming, son,** Two-Edge sent. **Keep sending... we’ll find you both.** 

By now One-Eye and Clearbrook had caught up with the distraught parents, and Aroree breathlessly explained the garbled sending. “Trolls. Crazed trolls. They have Brightmetal and Shenshen. Oh, my poor daughter – she tried to warn us – they’ve been under Blue Mountain all this time.” 

Clearbrook shuddered. She could almost smell the sickly scent from her dreams. Her newborn sword felt very heavy at her hip. 

“They’re beneath us,” Two-Edge said. “In the eastern passages... near Mother’s old chambers.” 

“What do they want with them?” One-Eye asked. 

“Does it matter?” Aroree exclaimed. She clutched at the talon whip at her waist. 

“No,” Clearbrook said evenly. “Let’s go.” 

* * * 

Shenshen squealed and scurried for cover as something dark came whistling down through the air. The toadstools rained down around her, one smacking her soundly on the head. 

“Is this your idea of hospitality?” Brightmetal shouted up. 

“Eat,” the jail keeper commanded. “Eat. Sleep. Then you make us treasure.” 

“Wormwater! You want treasure, you make it yourselves!” 

“You smith. You make us treasure.” 

“What is wrong with you, you pus-filled slug?” 

“He can’t understand you, Brightmetal,” Shenshen said. “He can’t understand anything but ‘smith’ and ‘treasure.’” 

“What happened to you?” Brightmetal shouted up. “How did your kin become such dull-witted lumps? You were proud trolls, once! You must have been. You knew King Guttlekraw. You knew that name at least!” 

“Guttle... kraw.” 

“Yes!” Brightmetal exclaimed. “Guttlekraw! Were you Guttlekraw’s trolls? Or Picknose’s?” 

“Guttle... kraw.” 

“Augh!” Brightmetal clutched his temples in exasperation. 

“He can’t understand,” Shenshen insisted. 

Brightmetal slumped down to the ground next to her. “Like talking to a treewee. He can’t do anything but mumble back the same sounds.” He picked up a toadstool and examined it. “At least they don’t plan to poison us. Probably don’t have the wits for that either.” He sighed. “How do good trolls rot into misfits like those, Shen? I’ve spied on the trolls of King Picknose... they’re noble folk, by and large. A little... slow sometimes. A little... rough around the edges. But they’re good folk. Like my grandfather, rest his bones.” 

“What about Guttlekraw?” 

“Well... he was cruel, but he was no fool. If he had ever stumbled on trolls as twisted as this lot, he’d kill them all before letting their stupidity infect the rest of the folk.” 

Shenshen considered it. “Whatever happened to Guttlekraw’s trolls?” 

“They became Picknose’s, when he took the crown. Then they became Slagg’s when he bested Picknose... then Picknose won them all back, and they’ve been his since then.” 

“All of them? No... old trolls who stayed loyal to Guttlekraw?” 

Brightmetal shrugged. “You only stay loyal to your king if he’s worthy of staying king. But... I suppose there might have been a few old warriors... ones Picknose wouldn’t trust... ones thrown out – ahhh!” 

Shenshen smiled patiently, nodding. “Ah.” 

Brightmetal beamed. “You’re so smart, Shen.” 

“One of us has to be, lifemate,” she replied smoothly, then squeaked as he tugged a hank of her hair playfully. 

**Son?** Two-Edge’s sending was closer now. **Where are you?** 

**Here,** Brightmetal sent. **A pit. We’re being guarded by at least one misfit.** 

**Have they hurt you?** Aroree’s concerned sending broke in. 

**A few bruises, that’s all. Though they didn’t leave my maiden with much to wear. They’re barking mad. All they can see anything with even a glint in metal in it. Treasure, treasure – that’s almost all they can say. They mean to keep me as their new smith. They’re gone rotten, all of them! They can’t make metals themselves so they expect me to do it for them.** 

**They know of old King Guttlekraw,**Shenshen added helpfully. 

**Aye. Shen thinks they might be leftovers from the Palace War. Could they go that rotten in so short a time?** 

**‘So short a time’ is a forest’s age, Brightmetal,** Clearbrook interrupted. 

Even as they sent to their captive friends, the elves and the half-troll crouched in the shadows, overlooking the three misfit trolls. **Thank High Ones for all your crawlspaces, Two-Edge,** Clearbrook added. 

**We’re almost there, son,** Two-Edge told Brightmetal. **Hold fast.** 

**Can they smell us?** One-Eye asked. 

**Trolls noses aren’t the sharpest,** Two-Edge replied. **Stay low. It’s their night-vision we have to worry about.** 

They clung to the rock shelf, spying on the nearly unintelligible conversation. The trolls seemed to be debating the fate of the prisoners. As Aroree and Two-Edge scowled at the trolls’ alien manners, One-Eye and Clearbrook quickly sized up the power hierarchy at work. 

“Should we...?” the smallest of the trio asked. “Smith... strong... master–” 

“I am master!” the largest misfit growled in his slurred speech. “Smith make treasure for us!” 

“Smith... stronger than Guttle-kraw...” argued the second one. 

“Smith make us stronger than Guttlekraw!” the leader intoned, thumping his fat chest for emphasis. “Smith make us weapons... make us treasure. Smith make us strong!” 

**That one,** Aroree sent. **The one with a barrel for a chest.** 

**Aye, he seems to be chief wolf here,** One-Eye sent. 

**Well... we know what to do,** Clearbrook drew her sword. 

**No...** Two-Edge sent. **Wait. We have to find the children first.** 

Clearbrook squinted in the gloom. Even with her night-vision, it was hard to distinguish the shadows from the rocks. The trolls did not use torches, and the pitch black was only broken by the faint glow of the phosphorescent moss growing on the rocks. But she could discern a doorway beyond the three arguing trolls. The captives were being held in the next room. 

Aroree and Two-Edge went to work even before Clearbrook could guess their plan. The former Chosen Eight floated high above the trolls as she hugged the curving ceiling of the cave. Two-Edge was behind her, scaling the walls with the nimbleness of a Wolfrider. The trolls never looked up; why would they? Aroree was on the other side in a heartbeat. Two-Edge followed more slowly, carefully picking his way across the crumbling handholds and footholds. But soon he too was on the ground, tiptoeing around the doorway while the trolls continued to bicker. 

“Why you master?” the second-largest troll challenged in a rumbling murmur. 

“I am strong!” Barrel snapped, backhanding the other one with a blow so slow and uncoordinated, any healthy creature could have sidestepped it. But not the shorter troll, who took it and stumbled under the weight of it. 

“Smith make us treasure...” the smallest one murmured. Clearbrook could almost hear the thought process slowly forming in his slurred words. “Smith make us strong. We... strong... too.” 

Barrel cuffed him too. Second saw a chance to redeem himself in his leader’s eyes and punched Third on the side of the head. 

The beating might have continued, but for the bloodcurdling wail that came from the other room. The three trolls looked up in horror. 

**Waiting’s over,** Clearbrook sent she dropped down from the ledge. One-Eye was close behind her. 

Barrel was quickest, and seeing the little creatures race towards them in a blur, he staggered back to safety. Third cowered, and Clearbrook bounded over his trembling frame. But Second stood his ground, and slowly brought up the crude rock hammer at his side. He was too slow, and Clearbrook’s flashing blade was just a whistle in his ear as it slit across his throat. 

* * * 

Two-Edge silenced the screaming guard with a hammer to the jaw. Aroree had already dispatched the other one with her talon-whip to the back of his neck. But Two-Edge had been slower to strike the second guard, and he had gotten off a warning to his friends before Two-Edge crippled him. 

**Father!** Brightmetal sent from the base of the pit. 

“Take it!” Aroree shouted as she threw her bloodied talon-whip down into the pit. “Your father will pull you up.” She handed the end of the cord to Two-Edge, who quickly wrapped it around his wrist-bracer. Aroree dove into the pit, floating down to the base to retrieved Shenshen. 

“No time for greetings,” she announced as she plucked the terrified elf off the floor. Shenshen wrapped her arms tight about Aroree’s shoulders and her legs about her waist as the Glider bore up out of the pit. Out of the corner of her eye, Aroree caught sight of Brightmetal winding the slack of the talon-whip’s cord around his own wrist before Two-Edge yanked it tight. 

Aroree dropped Shenshen on the edge of the pit. Two-Edge was slowly hauling his son up out of the pit, and Aroree and Shenshen hastened to help him, and lend him their added strength. 

One-Eye and Clearbrook burst into the chamber, blades drawn and bloodied. “We got one,” Clearbrook gasped out. “But chief wolf and the second one knew enough to get out of our range. They’re faster than they look.” 

“We’re going to have company, I think,” One-Eye said. 

In confirmation, a great murmuring war-cry echoed along the passageways. 

Brightmetal and Aroree helped haul Brightmetal the last few inches out of the pit. Bruised and bloodied, he scrambled to his feet, instinctively reaching for his own sword. “Slugs! They’ve got my sword somewhere!” 

“I’ll make you a new one,” Clearbrook said. “We have to get out of here.” 

“Wormwater! I say we clean house!” 

“We can argue later,” One-Eye barked. “Let’s go.” 

They ran down the corridor into the next chamber, only to find a dead end. The room was empty, the walls bare of handholds, the floor smooth save for one lumpy stalagmite near the far wall. 

“Double-back,” Brightmetal said, out of breath. 

“Not likely,” One-Eye said, as he cast a glance back into the prison pit chamber. Ten large trolls were shambling through the door, grunting and gurgling in slow-burning rage. 

Shenshen looked at the stalagmite sitting by the war. She looked up at the ceiling and saw no accompanying stalactite above it. In fact, the wall was completely smooth. 

“Not even bothering to hide it,” she grumbled, stalking over to the mineral column and yanking on it with all her might. 

The stalagmite tipped over under her slight weight and a grinding sound was her reward. Her family and friends turned around at the sound and gasped as the entire wall of the chamber slid away on old worn tracks. 

“By my father’s bones...” Two-Edge breathed. “I’d forgotten we ever built this deep.” 

The wall opened up, revealing the second marvel. Beyond it was a great chamber filled with priceless gems and precious metals. The light of the glowing moss bounded off the gold nuggets and diamond fragments, momentarily blinding them. The two trolls inside the chamber, their attentions formerly fixed on the treasure, turned about to face the intruders, mace and axe at the ready. Shenshen drew back at the sight of the misfits, but Brightmetal’s eyes scanned upwards, to the troll-forged weapons adorning the top of the great pile, lovingly set atop a shirt of gold coins. 

“My sword!” 

“Brightmetal!” Shenshen cried, but he was already racing ahead. He ably sidestepped the slower brutes, who could only grunt and belatedly swing their weapons. 

Brightmetal tripped on the rolling mound of pebbles and gems. The trolls chased after him as best they could. “Ah,” Brightmetal scooped up his sword just as the trolls reached him. He swung around and lashed out with his blade. One, then two, trolls went rolling back down the treasure pile, lame and bleeding. 

“Shen!” Brightmetal held aloft her golden shirt. He threw it in the air, and she raced forward to catch it. Snatching it, she quickly wriggled it back over her head and settled it over her ribcage. 

“Treasure!” the leader of the misfit growled. “They have our treasure!” 

The trolls advanced on the four elves and two part-trolls. They retreated into the treasure chamber, their weapons held high. 

“Fight to wound,” One-Eye said. “They’re no honour in slaying creatures like these.” 

“Don’t bet on it,” Brightmetal growled. 

“Skinnies!” Barrel raged as a curse. “Death to skinnies!” 

Two-Edge stepped forward. “I am the Master Smith!” he challenged. “Blue Mountain is my kingdom.” 

Second shuddered, and drew back. But Barrel was not moved. His thick lips curled back in a grimace, baring yellow teeth covered in brown fuzz. “I am master!” he howled indignantly. 

“Two-Edge – air!” Clearbrook called from the other side of the treasure hoard. “Fresh air. There’s a shaft angling up towards the surface. It’s just big enough, 

“Let’s go!” One-Eye said. “No point in shedding blood needlessly.” 

“Wormwater,” Brightmetal growled, but Two-Edge was already pushing his son behind him. “Go!” he barked. “We’ll hold up the rear.” 

Clearbrook waved Shenshen and One-Eye over the shaft. She went first, sword drawn at the ready. Shenshen scrambled up the shaft after her, while One-Eye followed. Aroree shoved Brightmetal ahead of her and urged him to keep climbing every time he slowed his progress. Two-Edge brought up the rear as promised, squeezing his bulk through the crack in the rock while the trolls raged behind him, a little too broad-shouldered to followed up the shaft. 

Barrel roared and beat on the rocks with his fists. His quicker-witted lieutenants deduced what he wanted, and began to chip at the opening with their old maces and axes. Little by little, the rock flaked away, until one great swing by a troll armed with a pickaxe dislodged a slab of stone, and the entrance open up. 

“Treasure!” Barrel shouted, a war-cry, before squeezing through the gap in the rocks and scrambling up after the fleeing elves. 

“Smooth as a rockshaped tunnel,” Clearbrook whispered in the gloom as she climbed higher. 

“It is rockshaped,” Aroree said in between coughing fits brought on by the dust in the shaft. “This must have been one of the old air shafts of Blue Mountain... during the great expansions.” 

“How did you know there was a secret door?” Brightmetal asked Shenshen. 

“I haven’t lived as a troll all this years for nothing, you know.” 

The growls of the trolls beneath them chased them up the air shaft. “Puckernuts,” One-Eyes cursed. 

“They’re coming,” Two-Edge said. “I can feel the rocks humming – they’re chipping away the shaft to follow us.” 

The air grew sharper, clearer. But still not fresh enough to be the dew-laden air of a clear night. Clearbrook reached the shaft’s terminus and scrambled up into another great chamber. The floor was worn smooth, as were the walls. Lying broken in each of the four corners were the remnants of great bird-shaped statues. 

One by one, they pulled themselves out of the shaft. The two Wolfriders looked up about helplessly, and Shenshen and Aroree were just as bewildered, but Two-Edge beamed as he recognized the chamber. 

“We’re in Mother’s den,” he murmured. “I help Father build this place.” 

“There’s still coming,” Brightmetal said, peering down the air shaft. Then he spat into the shaft. 

“I know where to go,” Two-Edge said, a cruel smile tugging at his lips. “I know...” 

* * * 

Barrel grunted as a dollop of sticky saliva struck his bald pate. He heard the skinny troll above taunting him. “Come on and get me, you slug-brained lump of clay...” 

Barrel and his misfits scrambled out of the air shaft, grimacing and moaning from the aches and pains of squeezing their corpulent bodies through the tiny passageway. 

“Skinnies!” Barrel shouted challengingly. They were standing in plain sight at the far side of the chamber, in a great arched doorway. As the misfits began to lurch towards them, they took off, disappearing into the shadows beyond the arch. 

Barrel looked around furtively as he lead the attack. They could not outrun the skinnies. Their poor diet in the deep caves left them laden with useless fat and devoid of any animal quickness. But they had stamina. They had the patience of stone. And they could track the skinnies until the passages dead-ended and trapped them like flies. 

But now Barrel felt unease creeping into his sluggish thought process. This room made him nervous. It smelled of old trolls like all the passages, but it had the look of something else. Skinnies... and something else entirely. It felt wrong. He couldn’t find the words to admit as much to himself. But he knew something wasn’t right. 

They had to take the two smiths. Everything would make sense once they had a smith working in the forge and creating treasure to add to their hoard. 

They stumbled after their prey. They chased them into another chamber, this one long and narrow and filled with strange new scents. One entire wall was carved in elaborate patterns which held enough glowing moss to bring a soft glow to the chamber. Dried, decayed plant life wrapped around the great pillars that held the ceiling aloft, and wound over their heads like a spider’s web. Two skinnies and the two smiths stood on staircase at the other of the chamber. Two of the females skinnies were perched on the columns, clinging to the dried vines. 

“Grrrrrrrummmmm....” Barrel slurred, taking a step forward. 

“You will obey me!” the larger of the two smiths commanded. “I am Two-Edge, Bane of Guttlekraw.” 

Several trolls shrank at the sound of Guttlekraw’s name. 

“I defeated Guttlekraw!” Two-Edge said. “He played toss-stone with me and he lost dearly. I am king here. You wish treasure? Then you will submit to me.” 

“I am master!” Barrel insisted again. “You will make us treasure. You... will... submit!” 

“I destroyed Guttlekraw,” Two-Edge said. “I am stronger than Guttlekraw. I am stronger than you. And I will destroy you if you challenge me.” 

**Anything else?** he asked his son in sending. 

**Just keep telling them you’ll make them treasure if they obey,** Brightmetal coached. **All they want is treasure.** 

Two-Edge glanced at his son. Then he looked down at the lumpish misfits. He decided to try a gamble. “Obey me and I will teach you to be smiths,” he promised. “You can make your own treasure.” 

Second stopped his stride. “Make... our treasure...?” he asked. 

“You make us treasure!” Barrel commanded. 

“You can all be smiths!” Two-Edge boomed. 

“Smith... all smiths...” Third considered it. “All strong...” 

“I am master – king!” Barrel said, delighting in the remembered word. “You... submit to me...” 

Still the trolls advanced across the chamber, but their pace was slowing. Only Barrel continued to march forward unafraid. 

“I built this kingdom,” Two-Edge said. “I can teach you to build your own.” 

Still Barrel shambled towards him, his mace raised. 

**Think we’ve waited long enough?” Brightmetal asked. 

**Another ten paces...** 

“You... not strong...” Barrel charged. “You... run. We... strong. We masters here.” 

**Not just yet,** Two-Edge sent. **Hold...* 

Barrel broke into a limping trot to cross the last distance between them. 

“Now!” Two-Edge shouted. 

Brightmetal pulled down on the concealed handle in the left-hand wall. One-Eye pulled down on the matching handle on the other side. The ceiling door trap opened up, and a great din of tumbling stone filled their ears. Great hollow obsidian balls rolled down atop the trolls, shattering into countless shards as they struck the stone. The globes struck trolls over the head, while their shards lodged in arms and legs as the trolls feebly tried to shield themselves. Clearbrook and Aroree sawed through the dried vines of strangleweed, and the net strung over trolls collapsed. The strangleweed was desiccated after nearly a thousand years of neglect, but it was not yet quite dead, and possessed enough strength to tighten around the trolls and pin them all thrashing to the ground. 

Two-Edge leisurely strolled down the steps and crunched black shards under his boots. “You are masters of nothing,” he sneered. 

“Master...” Third mumbled. “Master... smith...” 

Barrel growled, fighting against the net. 

“Smith!” one of the misfits suddenly shouted with a burst of mental clarity. 

“Smith!” another shouted. A murmur spread through the misfits. “King... smith... strong... master... master smith... Guttlekraw... stronger than Guttlekraw... smith... king... smith!” 

“King Smith!” Third howled suddenly. “King Smith!” 

“King Smith!” the cry went up. “King Smith!” 

“I am king!” Barrel roared. “I am king! I am–” 

And he was silenced suddenly as Third struggled to his knees and plunged a spear of broken obsidian into his back. 

Barrel roared. He coughed blood. And with a death rattle, he fell to the floor. Third and the other closest trolls struggled through the net to pile blows upon their former leader. 

“You only stay loyal to your king if he’s worthy of staying king,” Brightmetal said to Shenshen as she stared aghast at the spectacle. 

“King Smith!” Third shouted again. “King Smith! Submit to King Smith!” 

All the trolls fell to their faces, grovelling in abject obeisance. The elves exchanged completely baffled looks. Two-Edge, however, surveyed the misfits calmly. 

“I am your king?” he asked. 

“Yes!” Third whined. “King... king. You are strong. We are not. Make us strong, King Smith!” 

A chorus rose from the grovelling misfits. “Make us strong... make us strong...” 

“What do we do with them?” One-Eye asked no one in particular. 

Brightmetal looked over the misfits, and as Shenshen watched, the contempt slowly waned from his eyes, replaced by a dreamy sort of hope. 

* * * 

Clearbrook bundled up her new forge tools in soft cloth for the trip home. Death-sleep was beginning to encroach over the land. The deer were in rut, and the burrowers were racing to gather nuts for the long sleep. They would have to hurry to reach the Holt by first snow. 

The longsun had been spent honing her craft and making her own hammer and tongs, her pickaxe and other tools of the trade. Her silver sword was sharpened to a fine sheen and strapped to her hip. 

“Don’t expect to be a master at once,” Brightmetal warned her. “But we’ve given you the skills you’ll need to set up your own forge at your Evertree. A few years of practice, and you should be able to make some fine swords and spearheads for your tribe. I gotta say... I’m impressed. I didn’t think a Wolfrider could learn as much as you did in one month.” 

Clearbrook smiled gently. “Well then, if there’s hope for me, then perhaps there’s hope for the misfit trolls.” 

Brightmetal laughed. “We’ll do our best.” 

“How are the misfits?” Clearbrook asked as he escorted up from the forge towards the cave’s exit. 

Brightmetal shrugged. “Too soon to tell. We’re going to keep them in the lower caves for now. They’re starting to let Shenshen tend their wounds now, but they still can’t stand seeing Mother. Too ‘skinny.’ But they’re learning. They’re starting to pick up more words... starting to remember that we always come back the next day, and they don’t need to try to dig their way out of the caves. Maybe in a few more months we can give them back their picks without worrying they’ll try to stab us in the backs for our trouble.” 

“One-Eye’s not especially hopeful,” Clearbrook said. 

“Neither is Mother. Sometimes I’m not so sure. But... there were honourable trolls once. If we can help them remember what they used to be... we have a duty to them, don’t we?” 

“And you’d like to be prince of a kingdom of more than four, wouldn’t you?” 

“Well...” Brightmetal flushed. 

Two-Edge, Aroree and Shenshen were waiting above with One-Eye and the wolves to bid the travellers farewell. “You come back whenever you want,” Shenshen told Clearbrook as she embraced her. “Sometimes I really wish I had more than Aroree for female company. And I have a feeling having those misfits around won’t help much.” 

“Will you miss Blue Mountain?” One-Eye asked her as they began their long journey away from the broken rocks. 

“You know me better than that. No... it was a new way of seeing things, to be sure. But it will never take the place of clear air and cool leaves. Wherever I found my forge... I will need fresh air and starlight.” 

“There’s some nice overhangs of rock near the stream,” One-Eye suggested. “You could hollow yourself out a nice workshop under there.” 

Clearbrook smiled. “I need not ask if you are anxious to be home.” 

“The thought of spending white-cold denned in rock does not suit me.” 

“I’m sure it’s a warmer sort of denning than at the Holt. Great hearth fires and heated stones.” 

“I’ll take my furs and my lifemate.” One-Eye reached out to touch her hand, and smiled to see he could still make her blush. 

* * * 

The journey home was shorter. They hastened to cover more ground with each day. Even the wolves were visibly eager to return to familiar territory. They nuzzled the elves awake when they slept too long in the afternoons. The first frost had not yet come to the land when the tribe welcomed them back to the Evertree. 

The tribe had been busy preparing for winter, and Kit had recently finished tanning a great hide from a large shagback. The hair was already scraped off to use as boot liners and pillow fluff. But the hide itself was stretched out on a great A-frame in the council chamber, so One-Eye and Clearbrook could see the title already painted upon it. Neither of them could read it – they had never learned to decipher Kit’s ever-evolving writing system. But Kit happily translated for them. 

“We howl for Clearbrook Silversmith, first Wolfrider metalworker...” 

“You know, I think Kit’s howling hides are to blame for all this,” Clearbrook said later that night, after the howling and feasting had waned and all the elves retreated to their dens to bed down until the following afternoon. 

“Hmm?” One-Eye stroked her long hair lazily. “To blame for what?” 

“My hunger. My need for this quest.” 

“Why, lifemate?” 

“I... I don’t know exactly. Somehow... it was different long ago. When we were young memories never lingered long. Only the howlkeeper and the dreamberries could resurrect the old tales. Even the great chiefs’ deeds could easily be forgotten in the Now.” 

“We had little need for memories then.” 

“Yes. The world was smaller. Now... now everything is so much larger. Now we need our memories. Now we have the Scroll of Colours and the Egg... and Kit’s lovely hides. Things cannot be forgotten now. They exist... as fixed in the Now as this moment. The Now has become Forever. The last few turns I’ve been thinking a lot about Forever. How will my cubs’ cubs remember me? What howls will they sing... when this world becomes too old, and the Palace takes for the stars once and for all? Will they remember us? When... when I lie down forever, I want to know I gave something to my children... something more than a strong sword-arm and wise counsel. A gift all my own.” 

“You speak like someone who plans to lie down soon.” 

“No one can see their own tomorrow.” 

“I know you will see many to come.” He kissed her hand. 

She smiled gently. “We may have Forever. But that does not mean we should squander the Now.” 

“You never do.” 

They snuggled together under the furs to escape the night’s chill. “Hmm...” Clearbrook murmured. “I wonder if Kit’s little girl might take to metalwork...” 

“Might want to wait until she’s actually born before you start dreaming,” One-Eye said, cheered to hear her speak of the unborn child without resentment. 

“I don’t think I’ll be dreaming of trolls anymore...” 

“Hmm... Silversmith...” One-Eye whispered, and Clearbrook laughed softly before sleep took her.

**Author's Note:**

> Check out the full EQ Alternaverse at http://www.janesenese.com/swiftverse


End file.
